Report  on 

Employment  of  Native  Labor 

in 

Portuguese  Africa 


Report  on 

Employment  of  Native  Labor 

in 

Portuguese  Africa 


by 

Edward  Alsworth  Ross 

Professor  of  Sociology 
University  of  Wisconsin 


New  York 
1925 


PRINTED  IN  THE  U.  S.  A. 


The  Abbott  Press 

NEW  YORK,  U.  S.  A. 


Copy  of  a  letter  transmitting  the  following  report  to  the 
Temporary  Slavery  C ommission  of  the  League  of  Nations 


Room  1639,  25  Broad  Street, 

New  York,  June  5,  1925. 


The  Secretary-General, 

League  of  Nations, 

Geneva,  Switzerland. 

Sir  : 

We  beg  leave  herewith  to  transmit  to  you  the  report  prepared  by  Professor 
E.  A.  Ross  describing  the  results  of  his  enquiry  regarding  the  methods  of  em¬ 
ploying  labor  in  Angola  and  Portuguese  East  Africa.  We  would  respectfully 
request  that  this  report  be  placed  before  the  Temporary  Slavery  Commission  at 
its  next  meeting.  We  have  no  recommendations  or  other  requests  that  we  would 
make  excepting  that  the  Commission  should  give  to  the  situation  described  in  this 
report  its  most  careful  attention  with  the  hope  that  suitable  measures  may  be 
adopted  which  will  abolish  compulsory  labor  and  other  practices  that  are  an 
injustice  inflicted  upon  the  people  of  these  colonies. 

We  have  great  confidence  in  the  trustworthiness  of  Prof.  Ross  and  of  the 
evidence  which  he  has  presented  in  this  report.  Prof.  Ross  has  authorized  us  to 
say  that  he  will  willingly  appear  before  the  Commission  in  person  if  that  is  their 
desire  and  provided  a  suitable  time  can  be  mutually  agreed  upon. 

We  have  no  desire  to  criticise  unfairly  or  otherwise  to  embarrass  the 
Government  of  Portugal.  We  recognize  the  heroism  of  its  early  pioneers  in 
Africa  and  the  great  achievements  of  Portugal  in  the  development  of  its 
colonies.  We  are  confident  that  the  Government  of  Portugal  will  do  all  within 
its  power  to  abolish  all  evil  practices  in  the  employment  of  native  labor  in  its 
colonies  in  Africa. 

We  are,  dear  sir, 


Your  Obedient  Servants, 


George  Foster  Peabody, 
Raymond  B.  Fosdick, 

E.  E.  Olcott, 

Carrie  Chapman  Catt, 
John  H.  Finley, 

Thos.  S.  Donohugh, 
John  Grier  Hibben, 
Joseph  P.  Chamberlain 
Newton  D.  Baker, 


Glenn  Frank, 

Wm.  Jay  Schieffelin, 
H.  N.  MacCracken, 
Ernest  W.  Riggs, 
Hamilton  Holt, 
James  T.  Shotwell, 

A.  L.  Warnshuis, 
James  R.  Angell, 
James  G.  McDonald, 


Henry  Goddard  Leach. 


GLOSSARY 


Banian 

Indian  trader. 

Barracas 

Huts;  tents. 

Chefe 

Chief ;  head. 

Chicote 

Whip;  the  end  of  a  cable. 

Cipaio 

Native  police  generally  employed  in  garrisoning  the  posts 
and  collecting  hut-tax,  etc.,  from  the  natives. 

Corvee 

An  obligation  to  perform  certain  services  such  as  mending 
roads  for  the  government. 

Escudos 

Par  of  exchange  is  $0.50  or  £0/2/0%.  At  the  time  of  Prof. 
Ross’s  visit  $0.50  or  2  shillings  equalled  20  escudos. 

Fazenda 

An  estate,  a  farm,  a  land;  fortune,  wealth,  goods;  business; 
labour. 

Intendencia 

Native  affairs’  office. 

Manioc 

The  product  or  the  plant  of  the  bitter  or  the  sweet  cassava. 
A  tropical  plant  from  the  roots  of  which  tapioca  and 
starch  are  made,  and  which  forms  one  of  the  principal 
foods  of  the  natives. 

Palmatoria 

Rod;  punishment. 

Pano 

A  sheet  of  3%  yards  of  unbleached  muslin. 

Posto 

Post;  place;  office;  charge. 

Prazo 

A  form  of  concession  granted  to  the  highest  bidder.  “The 
holder  is  now  compelled  to  put  under  cultivation  a  fixed 
proportion  of  the  land  he  leases.  He  acts  as  magistrate 
and  tax-gatherer  to  the  natives,  but  at  the  same  time  it  is 
his  duty  to  look  after  their  welfare,  provide  them  with  seeds 
and  agricultural  implements,  educate  the  children,  and 
minister  to  the  sick.  He  is  entitled  to  maintain  a  number 
of  cipaes  or  native  soldiers  for  police  purposes.  It  is  the 
duty  of  district  governors  and  special  inspectors,  created  for 
the  purpose,  to  see  that  prazo-holders  fulfill  their  obliga¬ 
tions.  The  system  in  its  present  form  allows  scope  to  in¬ 
dividual  enterprise  and  energy,  and  under  it  agriculture  is 
making  considerable  progress  in  lower  Zambezia.” 

(Quoted  from  “A  Manual  of  Portuguese  East  Africa,” 
compiled  by  the  Geographical  Section  of  the  Naval 
Intelligence  Division.  London,  H.  M.  Stationery  Office, 
1920,  p.  145.) 

Shibaru  (xibalu) 

Term  of  compulsory  labor. 

Wattle-and-daub 

Wicker  work  daubed  with  mud  or  mortar. 

NOTE: 

Professor  Ross  is  not  responsible  for  the  marginal  notes. 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2018  with  funding  from 
Columbia  University  Libraries 


https://archive.org/details/reportonemploymeOOross 


REPORT  ON  COMPULSORY  LABOR  IN  PORTUGUESE 

AFRICA 


INTRODUCTION 

The  COMMISSION. — A  number  of  American  gentlemen  inter¬ 
ested  in  the  welfare  of  the  African  natives  persuaded  Prof.  Ross 
and  Dr.  Cramer,  who  were  planning  a  trip  to  India,  to  devote  half 
of  their  time  to  a  visit  to  the  Portuguese  colonies  in  Africa. 

Edward  A.  Ross  is  Professor  of  Sociology  in  the  University  of 
Wisconsin  and  the  author  of  nineteen  volumes  dealing  with  sociol¬ 
ogy  and  his  travels.  He  has  made  wide  tours  of  sociological  obser¬ 
vation  in  China,  Japan,  South  America,  Russia  and  Mexico.  He  is 
familiar  with  the  technique  of  social  investigation. 

R.  Melville  Cramer  is  a  New  York  physician  of  long  experi¬ 
ence,  especially  conversant  with  psychology  and  psychiatry.  He 
has  traveled  widely  and  investigated  social  conditions  not  only  in 
European  countries  but  in  Greenland,  Porto  Rico,  Brazil,  Mexico, 
China,  and  Japan. 

Neither  of  these  gentlemen  is  connected  with  a  church  or  with 
foreign  missions. 

OBJECT. — The  object  of  this  investigation  was  to  gather  the 
significant  facts  as  to  the  system  of  employing  native  labor  followed 
in  Portuguese  Africa. 

METHOD. — To  prosecute  inquiries  among  the  Portuguese 
officials  would  have  been  fruitless,  for  the  law  under  which  labor 
is  requisitioned  by  the  Government  in  these  colonies  is  well  known 
and  any  inquiries  addressed  to  the  officials  would  have  elicited  the 
response  that  they  are  proceeding  in  accordance  with  the  law.  What 
we  needed  to  know  was  not  the  system  as  laid  down  in  the  decrees 
or  as  officials  profess  to  carry  it  out,  but  the  actual  experiences  of 
large  numbers  of  natives  taken  at  random.  Accordingly  we  visited 
the  native  villages  in  the  bush,  gathered  the  people  together  and, 
through  an  interpreter  known  to  them  and  in  whom  they  had 
confidence,  questioned  them  as  to  their  compulsory  labor.  In  Angola 
nineteen  villages  were  visited  from  three  centres  not  less  than  two 
hundred  miles  apart.  The  facts  as  to  many  other  villages  were 
elicited  from  conversation  with  the  chief,  the  native  pastor  or  the 
native  teacher.  The  statements  were  taken  down  just  as  they  fell 
from  the  lips  of  the  interpreter  and  such  notes  form  the  basis  of 
this  report.  Data  were  secured  also  from  labor  groups  encountered 
on  the  highway  and  from  individuals.  Altogether  for  Angola  we 
have  the  experiences  of  from  six  thousand  to  seven  thousand  of  the 
native  population  in  three  different  provinces. 

The  method  gave  small  opportunity  to  mislead  the  investi¬ 
gator.  The  villagers  had  no  advance  knowledge  of  the  inquiry  and, 
if  any  one  of  them  had  attempted  to  misrepresent  facts  within  the 
knowledge  of  the  others,  his  fellow  villagers  would  certainly  have 
corrected  him.  Nor  is  it  likely  that  the  head  man,  pastor  or 
teacher,  interrogated  as  to  the  incidence  of  compulsory  labor  in 
his  village,  gave  false  answers. 


Personnel. 


Object. 


Method. 


PART  I 


1 


Women  with  babies 
working  on  the  road. 


2 

Work  without  pay. 


Voluntary  workers, — 
no  compulsion. 


ANGOLA 

So  far  as  possible  the  data  will  be  presented  in  the  order  in 
which  they  were  gathered.  They  were  collected  between  July  19 
and  September  3,  1924.  The  commissioners  made  their  enquiries 
separately,  and  what  follows  is  drawn  from  the  note  books  of  Pro¬ 
fessor  Ross. 

Work  Gang  A 

Sixty-five  natives  working  on  the  public  highway,  two-thirds 
of  them  women,  twelve  with  babies  on  their  backs.  I  inquired  how 
much  time  they  had  Worked  for  the  Government  in  the  last  year. 

Case  1. — In  the  last  5  months  has  worked  on  the  highways  3  months — a 
month  at  a  time. 

Case  2. —  Paid  his  1923  head  tax  (40  escudos=$1.00)  and  then  worked  3 
months  on  end  getting  out  timber  for  a  house.  Got  nothing  but  1.20  escudos 
ration  money  per  day,  which  was  not  more  than  enough  to  buy  two-fifths  of 
the  normal  ration.  Also  worked  some  weeks  on  the  road  for  which  he  got 
no  pay. 

Case  3. — Named  three  places  at  each  of  which  he  worked  two  weeks,  either 
roadmaking,  or  helping  build  a  house  for  the  road  boss.  No  food  was  supplied 
to  him,  no  wage  was  given  him — he  paid  his  taxes  besides,  for  which  he 
got  the  money  by  selling  his  produce. 

Case  U- — Worked  on  the  nearby  road  a  week  at  a  time  until  its  completion. 
No  ration  or  wage  or  tax  receipt. 

Case  5. — Worked  three  months — a  month  at  a  time — about  20  miles  from 
here,  one  month  on  one  road,  two  months  on  the  other.  Got  nothing  whatever. 
Neither  his  wife,  nor  the  wives  of  the  other  men  worked  on  the  highway. 

I  asked  the  women:  “Why  are  you  working  on  the  road?  Have 
you  no  husbands  to  work  for  you?” 

One  young  woman  said  that  some  days  she  comes,  some  days 
her  husband  comes.  Sometimes  after  the  men  are  taken  from  the 
village,  they  take  some  of  the  women.  Some  men  were  taken  to 
Catete  on  the  railroad  to  work  in  the  cotton  fields.  They  may  have 
to  stay  two  or  three  years  as  contracted  laborers.  Some  of  them 
have  been  sent  to  work  on  sugar  plantations  for  a  six-month’s  term, 
but  under  various  pretexts  the  time  may  be  prolonged  to  seven  or 
eight  months.  The  planter  told  them  that  he  had  “bought”  them  of 
the  Government,  that  they  were  his  slaves  and  that  he  did  not  have 
to  pay  them  anything.  They  got  only  their  food  and  a  receipt  for 
their  head  tax. 

Laborers  on  a  Mission  Estate 

None  of  a  group  of  eight  men  working  for  the  mission  has 
had  to  do  any  compulsory  labor  this  year.  This  obligation  rests 
only  on  natives  not  already  employed. 

A  village  chief  who  came  to  the  mission  for  counsel  said  that 
some  of  his  people  who  are  working  on  the  road  in  the  provincial 
capital  are  given  food,  but  it  is  insufficient,  so  that  they  have  to 
have  their  rations  supplemented  from  home.  Six  years  ago  ten 


Page  6 


men  from  his  village  were  taken  away  on  a  train  by  soldiers  to 
work  and  they  have  never  seen  them  since. 

The  boss  of  a  gang  building  a  church  said  that  none  of  his 
men  have  been  occupied  with  anything  but  free  labor  this  year. 
Four  others  have  been  on  paid  work  for  the  mission  for  two  years. 
From  them  the  Government  has  exacted  nothing  but  the  head  tax. 

Work  Gang  B 

One  of  the  gang  working  on  the  highway  said  he  had  worked 
a  whole  year  on  the  cut-off  on  the  railway,  receiving  plenty  of 
food  but  no  pay  other  than  a  receipt  for  his  tax.  No  complaint  of 
ill-treatment. 

In  the  evening  we  visited  the  camp  of  the  laborers  on  an 
estate,  and  questioned  fifty  or  sixty  men  and  boys.  One  had  worked 
for  nine  months  on  a  plantation  under  government  authority.  After 
three  months  he  received  a  pano  (a  sheet  of  3^4  yards  of  un¬ 
bleached  muslin)  ;  after  six  months  more  he  received  his  tax  receipt 
for  the  year.  Another  man  had  worked  on  a  plantation  for  a  year 
and  received  nothing  but  a  pano  and  his  tax  receipt.  At  that  time 
the  ordinary  wage  was  a  pano  a  month. 

Another  testified  that  six  years  ago  twenty-five  or  thirty  men 
from  his  village  were  taken  to  San  Thome  and  had  never  been 
heard  from  since.  All  agreed  that  in  recent  years  much  more 
service  has  been  exacted  of  them  than  formerly.  They  are  Ambaca 
people  and  these  people,  who  were  converted  to  Christianity  and 
became  acquainted  with  letters  more  than  two  centuries  ago  and 
who  formerly  were  impressed  only  as  soldiers,  are  being  crushed 
down  into  compulsory  labor  along  with  other  blacks. 

The  Songo  district,  not  far  from  here,  was  so  nearly  depopu¬ 
lated  by  the  Government  recruiting  for  the  plantations  that  in  1923 
the  High  Commissioner  decreed  that  for  five  years  the  Songos 
should  not  be  recruited  for  work  outside  that  district.  As  we  shall 
see,  however,  this  order  has  not  been  obeyed. 

Village  No.  1 

Songo  people.  Forty  were  present  besides  a  swarm  of  boys 
and  girls,  few  women.  The  interview  took  place  in  the  shade  of 
the  mango  grove  about  noon  of  a  bright  day.  A  very  intelligent 
and  attractive  young  man  took  an  active  part  in  the  proceedings. 

Case  1. — Went  to  a  Government  plantation  for  four  months;  then  eleven 
months  on  a  Government  coffee  experiment  station.  He  got  two  panos  during 
this  period,  his  tax  receipt  for  1923  and  food — no  money. 

Case  2. — After  serving  three  months  on  a  Government  plantation  where  the 
workers  were  beaten,  and  three  months  as  carrier  for  a  government  engineer, 
he  was  advised  to  enlist  as  a  soldier.  When  he  declined  they  would  give  him  no 
tax  receipt,  so  he  had  to  catch  fish  in  order  to  get  the  money  with  which  to  pay 
his  head  tax.  In  1922  he  served  as  carrier  under  heavy  burden  on  a  three- 
months’  trip  to  Loanda.  Within  a  year  he  was  sent  with  a  heavy  load  to  a 
point  85  miles  from  his  home.  He  got  neither  money  nor  tax  receipt. 

Case  3. — Government  recruited  him  in  1920  and  “sold”  him  to  the  petroleum 
company.  He  worked  for  it  seven  months,  at  the  end  of  each  three  months  he 
got  a  pano  worth  three  escudos  (at  this  date  the  escudo  was  worth  perhaps  a 


No  wages  for  nine 
months. 


Deportation — 
Increasing  exactions. 


Depopulation. 


4 


No  pay. 


Carrying  without  pay. 


5 

Sold  to  a  company. 
Well  fed,  not  beaten, 
no  pay. 


Page  7 


Deported. 


6 

Labor,  not  taxes, 
wanted. 


7 


Commandeering  men 
and  women. 


8 


Taxes  plus  labor. 


Children  included. 


Flogging. 


shilling).  At  the  end  of  seven  months  he  was  told  that  he  had  seventy  escudos 
due  him,  which  would  be  paid  him  at  the  station  where  he  had  been  recruited. 
However,  he  got  nothing  there  but  the  receipt  for  his  head  tax.  He  asked  about 
his  wages  but  was  told  there  was  nothing  for  him.  Under  the  petroleum  com¬ 
pany  they  were  well-fed  and  were  not  beaten. 

Case  ]*. — The  village  chief  declared  that  eight  years  ago  the  officials  took 
from  his  people  eighty-four  persons  and  forty-four  from  the  people  of  the  ad¬ 
jacent  chiefs.  Nothing  has  been  heard  from  them  nor  of  them.  He  supposes 
that  they  are  at  San  Thome.  After  three  years  the  two  chiefs  were  called  by  the 
local  authorities  and  told  to  be  patient.  “We  will  send  for  these  men  and  have 
them  brought  back.”  But  none  have  ever  come  back. 

Case  5. — In  September  1923  the  tax  collector  called  for  the  taxes  (40 
escudos  a  head),  but  when  cash  was  offered  he  would  not  take  it  and  the  “tax 
delinquents”  were  all  recruited  and  sent  to  work  on  a  private  plantation  where 
they  still  are.  The  planter  accompanied  the  tax  collector,  who  refused  to  accept 
cash  from  such  natives  as  the  white  man  said  he  wanted  to  work  for  him. 

In  February  1924,  80  more  men  were  taken  from  this  “area.”  Those  who 
had  the  cash  and  paid  their  taxes  at  once  were  let  off,  but  those  slow  in  getting 
their  money  together  were  recruited  and  their  money  for  taxes  was  refused. 
They  were  advised  to  take  the  money  along  with  them  to  buy  food  with ;  but  they 
were  shrewd  enough  to  send  their  money  back  to  their  families.  They  are  still 
on  the  plantation. 

Case  6. — Beginning  with  June,  1923,  this  village  was  required  to  furnish 
men  and  women  for  Government  work.  They  go  for  two  weeks  at  a  time,  some 
of  them  on  the  Government  grange  near  Malange,  others  on  the  Malange-Bie 
highway.  Both  men  and  women  are  requisitioned  and  they  must  provide  their 
own  food. 

In  three  towns  about  five  miles  apart  one  hundred  and  fifty  persons  have 
thus  been  commandeered.  This  has  been  going  steadily  for  thirteen  months, 
rain  or  shine.  They  get  no  rations.  Those  who  had  paid  their  head  tax  were 
not  let  off  from  this  labor.  The  villages  at  the  greater  distances  from  the  road 
were  harder  hit.  Those  living  near  the  work  have  means  of  getting  on  the  good 
side  of  the  bosses. 


Village  No.  2 

In  the  late  afternoon  we  sat  in  the  shade  of  big  trees  and 
interrogated  about  seventy  Ambaquistas.  They  are  of  a  superioi 
type,  and  I  saw  many  faces  of  worthy,  mild  and  excellent  men. 

Case  A— Had  to  labor  two  weeks  at  a  stint  on  the  Government  plantation, 
supplying  his  own  food.  This  in  addition  to  paying  taxes.  Since  December  1st 
this  village  has  been  furnishing  workers  on  this  plantation.  Generally  the  recruits 
worked  two  weeks  out  of  six,  i.e.,  in  the  six  months  this  lasted  the  average 
villager  worked  two  months  on  the  plantation.  They  were  under  the  hippo-hide 
whip  and  came  back  thin.  No  pay. 

Case  2. — Some  have  been  taken  from  here  to  work  on  routes  leading  out 
of  Malange.  They  are  worked  two  weeks  at  a  time  and  get  nothing.  This 
has  lasted  eight  months  and  the  family  still  have  to  furnish  members  for  this 
work.  The  soldiers  come,  catch  the  people,  children  included,  and  tie  them  up. 
They  take  about  half  of  the  family,  leaving  the  other  half  to  change  off  with  it. 

Case  3. — Was  working  as  mason  for  a  building  contractor  in  town,  left 
him  because  he  was  allowed  but  six  cents  a  day  for  food — which  was  insuffi¬ 
cient — and  he  got  no  pay  on  the  ground  that  he  was  a  learner.  The  contractor 
retaliated  by  giving  his  name  to  the  Government,  so  he  was  recruited.  After 
two  months  as  carrier  on  Government  jobs  in  Malange,  he  was  sent  to  Benguela 
where  he  worked  six  months  on  street  work  for  which  he  received  rations  but 
no  pay.  He  had  already  paid  his  head  tax.  On  both  jobs  he  was  maltreated. 
They  would  flog  a  man  until  he  could  hardly  stand  up  and  then  send  him  to 
work  just  the  same.  Some  died,  but  none  from  this  village. 


Page  8 


Spokesmen  of  the  village  say  that  from  fear  of  rebellion  the 
Government  keeps  ammunition  from  the  people,  so  that  they  hunt 
only  with  bows  and  spears.  They  cannot  get  ammunition  for 
their  old  muzzle-loaders.  In  recent  years,  much  greater  care  has 
been  exercised  in  keeping  powder  and  cartridges  from  the  natives. 

In  practice  forced  labor  works  out  as  follows.  A  laborer 
works  for  the  coffee  planter  and  at  the  close  of  his  term  of  service 
the  planter  says,  “I  can’t  pay  you  anything  for  I  have  deposited 
the  stipulated  wage  for  you  with  the  Government;  go  to  such  and 
such  an  office  and  you  will  get  your  pay.”  The  worker  applies 
there  and  is  told  to  come  around  in  a  couple  of  months.  If  he  has 
the  temerity  to  do  so,  he  is  threatened  with  the  calaboose  and  that 
ends  it.  It  is  all  a  system  of  bare-faced  labor  stealing.  They  think 
that  the  planter  has  really  paid  for  their  labor,  but  that  the  official 
does  them  out  of  it.  It  is  frequently  observed  that  the  official  comes 
suddenly  into  prosperity  and  this  is  suspected  to  be  the  source  of  it. 

If  a  private  employer  wants  to  retain  a  worker,  he  advances 
the  man’s  tax  and  the  man  is  unmolested.  If,  on  the  other  hand, 
one  has  worked  for  a  private  employer  for  months  but  for  any 
reason  leaves  that  employment,  he  is  liable  to  be  recruited  by  the 
Government.  Past  employment  affords  him  no  protection.  The 
villagers  insist  that  times  are  worse  for  them  than  they  used  to  be 
under  the  king.  More  unrequited  toil  is  exacted  now  than  a  few 
years  ago. 

Other  Evidence 

From  natives  passing  our  place  of  entertainment  we  learn’  that 
at  K — ,  forty  miles  away,  the  Government  recruits  many  natives  and 
puts  them  at  the  disposal  of  the  planters.  They  work  six  months 
for  food  and  60  escudos  ($1.50).  Forty  escudos  are  kept  back  to 
pay  their  taxes,  so  that  for  their  six  months  work  they  net  only  20 
escudos  (half  a  dollar). 

Four  years  ago  a  large  number  who  were  tax  delinquents  were 
sent  to  San  Thome  and  have  never  returned.  Since  then  the  forced 
labor  of  these  people  amounts  to  six  months  a  year.  Their  wives 
have  to  work  on  the  roads,  but  are  not  recruited  for  the  plantations. 
The  men  are  carried  off  as  far  as  one  hundred  miles  to  work  on  the 
road,  for  which  they  get  their  food  and  their  tax  receipts.  When 
they  work  on  the  road  near  their  home  they  have  to  furnish  their 
own  food.  On  the  plantations  some  die  from  being  made  to  work 
after  having  been  weakened  by  flogging. 

I  talked  with  a  man  whose  two  neighbors  were  taken  to  work 
a  year  on  a  plantation  a  few  miles  out  from  Malange.  They 
received  nothing,  not  even  a  tax  receipt.  Their  taxes  being  unpaid 
they  cannot  get  a  pass.  Not  having  a  pass,  they  cannot  venture 
outside  of  this  district  without  running  the  risk  of  being  jailed. 

Work  Gang  C 

From  our  headquarters  we  make  excursions  in  all  directions, 
sometimes  to  a  distance  of  sixty  miles,  so  that  a  considerable  terri¬ 
tory  is  sampled.  At  one  point  we  pass  fifty  clearing  the  ground 
for  the  highway.  They  have  to  work  two  or  three  months  without 


Arms  taken  away. 


9 


A  summary. 
Labor  stealing. 


10 


Recruited  for  planters. 


Forced  labor  six 
months  each  year. 


No  pay  for  a 
year’s  work. 


11 

Similar  conditions 
over  wide  area. 


Page  9 


rations  or  pay  and  this  service  does  not  absolve  their  head  tax. 
They  work  in  two-week  shifts  so  that  the  service  of  the  individual 
comes  to  from  four  to  six  weeks.  To  obtain  money  for  the  head  tax 
they  either  sell  produce  or  work  from  two  to  three  months  for  some 
planter. 


12 


Work  Gang  D 


No  end  to  road  work. 


Women  at  work. 


Forty  miles  away  talked  with  a  road  force  of  thirty.  They 
said  there  is  no  end  to  road  work,  it  goes  on  all  the  time.  They 
claim  that  three  or  four  years  ago  certain  members  of  their  village 
were  recruited  for  work  on  distant  coffee  plantations  and  have  not 
come  back. 

These  workers  have  no  proper  tools,  no  spades,  picks,  shovels, 
wheelbarrows — nothing  but  their  footy  native  hoes  and  round 
baskets.  Among  them  are  women  with  infants  on  their  backs, 
women  nearing  their  time  of  delivery,  and  children  as  young  as 
twelve  years.  Their  work  is  not  of  a  heavy  type.  They  hoe 
together  a  little  dirt,  draw  it  into  a  basket  holding  about  a  peck, 
walk  to  the  side  of  the  road  and  dump  it. 


13  Village  No.  3 

Fifty  natives  stand  about  us  as  we  sit  at  high  noon  under  the 
Taken  far  from  home,  deep  eaves  of  the  thatched  mission  school.  Thirty  are  passing 

wayfarers  who  have  been  working  for  six  months  on  cotton  planta¬ 
tions  two  hundred  miles  away.  They  have  been  on  the  road  ten 
days  and  are  still  two  days’  journey  from  home.  They  are  the  last 
batch  of  two  hundred  such  workers  who  have  been  passing  through 
here  lately.  They  are  bound  for  D —  to  get  their  pay  for  the  last 
four  months,  the  first  two  months  of  service  having  gone  to  pay 
their  head  tax.  They  were  told  they  would  receive  50  escudos  a 
month,  which  would  come  to  200  escudos  apiece.  One  of  them 
says  that  he  has  been  requisitioned  three  times.  The  first  time, 
four  years  ago,  he  worked  eight  months  on  a  plantation  in  order  to 
absolve  his  head  tax  of  ten  escudos;  the  second  time  he  was  on 
Government  work  and  got  21  escudos  for  eight  months’  work,  out 
of  which  ten  escudos  went  for  head  tax.  The  third  time  he  was 
getting  out  railway  timbers  for  a  planter  about  200  miles  from 
here.  Ten  of  his  fellow  workers  lost  their  lives  by  falling  from 
tree  tops  or  by  cutting  themselves  with  the  axe.  The  first  month 
the  planter  gave  them  fish  to  eat  with  their  manioc  mush,  after 
that  they  were  given  nothing  but  manioc  meal,  so  they  went  out 
into  the  bush  and  collected  herbs  to  make  their  mush  palatable. 
On  arrival  they  got  each  half  a  pano,  a  blanket  and  a  cheap  cotton 
jersey.  After  that  nothing.  They  could  have  gotten  home  quickly 
by  railroad,  no  transportation  was  provided,  however.  For  the 
ten  days’  trip  home  they  received  mouldy  flour  and  no  fish. 

Other  wayfarers  state  that  in  the  village  they  come  from  all 
the  men  were  requisitioned  and  only  women  are  available  for  road 
work. 


Page  10 


On  a  Farm 


We  stop  at  the  farm  of  two  Germans  from  East  Africa  who  Voluntary  labor, 
have  hired  land  from  a  Portuguese.  They  pay  their  blacks  sixty 
centavos  a  day  and  their  keep.  They  engage  them  directly,  being 
convinced  that  nothing  is  gained  by  hiring  them  from  the  Govern¬ 
ment.  The  cost  comes  to  about  the  same  and  they  can  pick  their 
blacks,  whereas  the  planter  who  contracts  with  the  Government 
has  to  take  such  as  the  Government  sends  him.  The  contract  period 
of  the  blacks  is  six  months  which,  however,  may  be  extended  by 
fines  for  misconduct,  breakages,  or  pretenses  of  the  same.  The 
Germans  do  not  know  whether  or  not  the  blacks  actually  receive 
the  wages  the  planter  pays  the  Government  for  them. 


Other  Evidence 


14 


The  white  residents  testify  that  the  natives  are  now  not  nearly 
so  well  clothed  as  they  were  ten  years  ago.  During  the  war  the 
price  of  cloth  rose  rapidly,  while  money  wages  went  up  slowly. 
In  1917  a  European  woman  going  out  in  hammock  from  Malange 
found  the  first  day  out  that  the  natives  were  wearing  one  pano 
instead  of  three;  the  second  day  out,  rags;  and  the  third  day, 
leaves.  The  women  complained  that  they  had  no  cloth  in  which  to 
tie  their  babies  to  them,  so  that  “their  backs  felt  lonesome.” 

The  foreman  of  a  certain  estate  told  us  that  in  1921  he  worked 
six  months  for  a  sizal  planter  who  told  the  workers  that  he  had 
“bought”  them  of  the  Government.  He  daily  got  enough  food  for 
one  noon  meal.  At  the  end  of  his  service  he  received  a  pano  and 
a  shirt.  He  asked  for  more  and  was  told  to  apply  to  those  who 
sent  him.  He  did  apply  to  this  official,  but  was  told  that  he  had 
already  had  enough  pay.  He  did  not  have  to  pay  head  tax  that 
year,  but  his  wife  had  to  work  on  the  road.  Afterward  he  worked 
as  a  free  laborer  on  a  plantation,  where  he  got  his  food  and  ten 
escudos  a  month.  Every  year  his  family  works  two  months  on 
the  highway.  He  says  that  the  lot  of  the  black  has  been  getting 
harder.  Unless  he  is  working  for  a  white  man  unpaid  service  will 
be  required  of  him  for  half  a  year.  The  chief  is  called  to  furnish 
so  many  men  from  his  village  and  will  be  jailed  if  they  are  not 
forthcoming. 

A  mulatto  woman  tells  how  a  sugar  planter  at  Alto  Dondi 
asked  for  workers,  so  the  authorities  sent  for  them  up  to  her 
district  and  the  officials  scoured  the  country  for  them.  The  men 
got  bad  food  and  were  beaten.  Their  term  of  service  was  to  be 
six  months,  but  near  the  end  of  this  period  some  machinery  broke 
and  the  blacks  were  required  to  work  long  enough  to  pay  for  the 
breakage.  They  stayed  a  year  and  were  sent  back  empty  handed. 
Some  returned  to  find  their  families  broken  up  and  gone. 


Increasing  poverty. 


Contract  laborers 
unpaid. 


15 


Village  No.  4 

Fifty  villagers  are  gathered — Ambaquistas.  They  say  that  in  16 
the  time  of  the  monarchy  (before  1910),  although  they  were  slaves, 
they  were  better  off  and  got  more  for  their  work.  Their  lot  is 


\ 


Page  11 


Worse  than  slavery. 


Wages  withheld. 


Contracts! 


17 

A  village  scene. 


Government  carriers. 


getting  harder.  Things  got  abruptly  worse  for  them  1917-1918. 
The  Government  makes  them  work  but  gives  them  nothing.  They 
return  to  find  their  fields  neglected,  no  crops  growing.  They  would 
rather  be  slaves  than  what  they  are  now.  As  slaves  they  have 
value  and  are  not  underfed,  but  now  nobody  cares  whether  they 
live  or  die.  This  Government  serfdom  is  more  heartless  than  the 
old  domestic  slavery,  which  was  cruel  only  when  the  master  was 
of  cruel  character.  Now  they  are  in  the  iron  grasp  of  a  system 
which  makes  no  allowance  for  the  circumstances  of  the  individual 
and  ignores  the  fate  of  the  families  of  the  labor  recruits. 

There  are  140  huts  in  this  area,  which  extends  five  miles  by 
two.  For  fifteen  months  not  less  than  50  have  been  required  to 
work  on  the  roads,  and  some  months  more  than  one  hundred.  The 
quota  is  maintained  by  shifts. 

When  a  white  man  applies  to  the  administrador  for  workers 
a  soldier  is  sent  with  him  to  the  village  who  calls  out  the  chief 
and  notifies  him  that  so  many  men  must  be  forthcoming  from  that 
village.  When  men  are  taken  for  distant  plantations,  they  are  pro¬ 
vided  with  a  thin  jersey,  a  patio ,  and  in  the  cool  season  a  blanket. 
Two  months  ago  thirty  from  this  area  were  taken  to  an  unknown 
destination. 

In  1922  twenty  from  this  area  were  requisitioned  to  work  as 
carriers  between  L —  and  P — .  Their  taxes  had  already  been  paid. 
For  six  months’  service  they  got  the  equivalent  of  $1.80.  They 
think  that  the  Government  gets  twelve  dollars  for  every  man  who 
works  for  the  planter  six  months.  Somebody  keeps  most  of  it  so 
that  the  laborer  gets  no  pay. 

The  law  contemplates  that  the  laborer  shall  enter  into  labor 
contracts  with  a  free  will.  These  Ambaquistas  say  that  they  put 
their  thumb  prints  on  some  papers,  but  do  not  know  what  these 
papers  contain  and  would  be  flogged  should  they  dare  refuse  to 
sign  them.  The  Government  keeps  all  these  contracts.  They  are 
para  Ingleza  ver,  i.e.,  “for  the  English  to  see.” 

Village  No.  5 

When  we  reach  such  a  village  with  its  huts  of  grass,  or  of 
wattle-and-daub,  scattered  about  in  the  bush,  its  little  corn  cribs, 
its  pens  for  pigs,  goats  and  chickens,  its  tiny  banana  plantations  and 
gardens,  the  people  hasten  to  put  on  their  best  and  soon  they  assemble 
about  us  as  we  sit  on  chairs  in  the  shade  of  a  tree,  some  sitting  on 
stools  or  benches,  some  on  mats,  while  others  stand  patiently.  They 
are  clad  in  panos,  bed  blankets,  old  coats,  overcoats,  jerseys,  shirts, 
undershirts,  overshirts,  cast-off  uniforms,  rags  and  in  nothing  at 
all  save  the  G  string.  The  elders  wear  skull  caps,  bear  staffs  and 
drape  their  pano  or  blanket  about  them  with  much  dignity.  They 
listen  most  respectfully  while  the  boys  and  women  sit  perfectly 
quiet.  In  this  case  seventy  Ambaquistas  are  present  of  whom 
twenty  are  men. 

They  state  that  six  years  ago  five  requisitioned  by  the  Govern¬ 
ment  from  this  village  were  taken  to  San  Thome  and  never  came 
back.  Last  November  four  had  to  be  sent  to  Catete  to  serve  six 


Page  12 


months.  Six  weeks  later,  these  four  having  run  away,  the  police 
came  and  required  four  others  in  their  place.  In  such  cases  it  is 
the  chief  in  council  who  decides  who  shall  go.  Every  few  weeks 
a  requisition  comes  for  Government  carriers  and  the  service  lasts 
from  two  weeks  to  three  months  according  to  the  distance  they  are 
sent.  For  a  short  trip  they  get  nothing  but  rations;  for  a  long  trip 
they  get  also  a  tax  receipt.  Forced  labor  began  in  1914  and  has 
been  worse  since  1917. 

The  new  highway  was  begun  three  years  ago,  and  the  twenty 
families  of  this  village  had  to  keep  eight  persons  constantly  at 
work.  The  last  year  the  quota  has  been  five.  They  feed  themselves. 

Native  Evangelists 

An  evening  with  three  young  native  evangelists  brought  out 
significant  testimony. 

At  a  place  thirty  miles  away  ninety  natives  were  charged  with 
building  eight  miles  of  good  road.  Those  who  had  nobody  to 
“spell”  them  went  home  Saturday  noon  for  a  week’s  supply  of  food 
and  returned  Sunday  evening.  The  native  bosses  had  been  on  this 
work  for  over  a  year  and  yet  could  not  leave  it.  The  one  white 
boss  was  the  only  one  who  got  pay. 

In  a  county  seat,  outside  the  regular  Government  officials  only 
two  men  got  any  pay — one  a  white  man  and  one  a  black  linesman 
from  Loanda.  All  others  working  for  Government  there  got  noth¬ 
ing,  not  even  their  food,  and  they  were  in  rags. 

Five  weeks  before,  two  hundred  natives  arrived  from  N — 
headed  by  a  white,  escorted  by  three  soldiers.  They  had  been  sold 
by  the  officials  at  N —  to  a  coffee  planter  who  had  paid  27,000 
escudos  ($675)  for  them.  They  were  quite  thin  and  eleven  died  on 
the  three  days’  march.  If  they  dropped  on  the  march  no  one  was 
allowed  to  stop  and  cover  them  with  earth.  “Why  waste  time  on 
these  worms?”  Of  the  two  hundred,  thirty  were  sick  at  the  county 
seat  and  four  died. 

The  married  sister  of  a  native  evangelist  testifies  that  a  planter 
at  R —  pays  the  taxes  of  tax  delinquents,  who  then  have  to  work  for 
him  gratuitously  for  six  months. 

One  evangelist  tells  how  in  1922  he  was  in  P — ,  county  seat 
of  the  Songo  country  and  found  many  poor  women  who  had  nothing 
to  eat  or  wear.  They  had  been  sent  to  Loanda  and  elsewhere  to 
work  for  the  whites  so  that  they  had  no  chance  to  make  gardens  for 
themselves.  Here  he  saw  three  hundred  women  carrying  clay  to 
make  bricks  and  asked  them,  “What  will  the  Government  pay  for 
this  work?”  “Nothing,”  they  answered,  “but  they  will  pay  us  with 
a  stick  if  we  don’t  furnish  clay.”  In  other  villages  he  found  the 
people  starving  because  the  able-bodied  had  been  sent  far  away, 
while  the  women  were  required  to  do  so  much  unpaid  public  work 
that  they  had  no  time  for  growing  their  own  food.  In  some  parts 
he  found  that  the  people  had  no  cloth  and  had  to  cover  their  naked¬ 
ness  with  bark  cloth.  The  women  even  tied  their  babies  on  with 
this. 


Highway  maintenance. 


18 


Road  workL  no  pay. 


Deaths  on  the  march. 


Work  six  months 
to  pay  taxes. 


Forced  labor  of  women. 


Page  13 


19 

Continuous  road  work. 


20 

Tax  delinquents. 


21 

Women  with  babies. 


No  tools. 


Road  Workers 

In  leaving  this  part  of  Angola  we  talked  with  natives  working 
on  the  road.  One  told  us  his  village  has  been  working  on  this 
piece  of  road  for  years.  Formerly  those  who  rendered  military 
service  were  exempt  from  industrial  service  and  head  tax;  but  this 
is  no  longer  so.  Our  informant,  who  has  been  working  steadily  on 
the  road  for  two  years,  can  tend  his  garden  only  on  Sundays  and 
evenings.  The  Commandant  of  the  Post  made  him  responsible 
for  a  certain  stretch  of  road.  He  gets  neither  food  nor  pay  and  has 
to  find  his  head  tax  besides.  No  one  from  this  village  is  taken  for 
the  plantations;  the  road  is  all  that  they  can  do. 

Village  No.  6 

Natives  called  out  from  this  village,  which  we  reach  a  little 
further  on,  report  that  a  gang  of  men  taken  away  to  labor  nine 
months  ago  are  not  back  yet.  Taxes  here  are  collected  in  such  a 
way  as  to  create  as  many  delinquents  as  possible.  Those  who  do 
not  produce  the  money  when  summoned  are  “delinquents”  and  they 
never  know  when  they  will  be  summoned.  No  one  is  given  a  chance 
to  go  off  and  catch  fish  or  market  his  produce  in  order  to  obtain 
tax  money,  for  lately  it  has  been  ordered  that  no  one  may  have  a 
pass  to  go  into  another  township  unless  his  taxes  have  been  paid. 
From  a  neighboring  village  in  1921  tax  “delinquents”  were  taken 
away  for  six  months’  service.  Some  have  never  come  back.  Those 
who  did  had  nothing  to  show  for  their  work  but  a  tax  receipt. 

Women  Working  On  Roads 

Where  a  highway  crosses  the  swamp  I  count  ninety-nine  per¬ 
sons,  nearly  all  women  and  girls,  carrying  earth  in  baskets  on  their 
heads  about  three  hundred  yards  to  make  a  huge  fill.  There  are 
thirteen  babies  on  backs  and  twelve  of  the  gang  are  too  young  to 
be  mothers.  A  mile  further  on  I  find  twenty-nine  women  carrying 
earth,  of  whom  fourteen  have  babies  on  their  backs.  Five  men 
are  on  their  job,  one  a  foreman.  Some  have  been  three  months 
on  the  job  alternating  with  a  member  of  their  family.  The  foreman 
says  he  is  under  orders  not  to  beat  those  who  do  not  appear 
regularly.  Those  who  run  off  and  hide  in  the  bush  he  reports  to 
the  Chief  of  the  Post.  The  regular  force  is  fifty,  but  twenty-one 
are  sick,  mostly  of  influenza. 

Cutting  Trees 

It  is  a  shame  that  when  a  road  must  be  cut  through  a  hard 
wood  forest,  the  Government  furnishes  no  steel  axes  with  which 
to  fell  the  trees.  From  the  stumps  I  judge  that  five  times  as  many 
strokes  of  the  little  native  iron  ax  are  needed  to  fell  a  tree  as  of  a 
good  steel  ax.  I  picked  out  a  hard-wood  tree,  eighteen  inches 
through  at  the  base,  and  asked  how  long  it  would  take  to  fell  it 
with  their  iron  axes.  They  said  four  people  would  require  half 
a  day.  With  a  good  ax  I  could  do  it  in  two  hours. 


Page  14. 


Village  No.  7 

This  village  has  forty-eight  huts  sheltering  about  four  hundred. 
At  least  a  hundred  were  about  us  and,  as  it  was  noon,  wore  nothing 
save  the  loin  cloth.  They  reported  that  two  of  their  fellows  after 
having  worked  two  months  at  the  county  seat  on  public  buildings 
were  sent  to  work  for  planters  in  the  coffee  region.  At  the  outset 
each  was  given  three  pieces  of  clothing.  After  working  six  months 
they  received  30  escudos  ($.75)  from  the  planter  and  on  returning 
to  the  county  seat  the  administrador  gave  them  60  escudos  ($1.50) 
each,  out  of  which  40  escudos  head  tax  had  to  be  paid.  Their  “net” 
then  was  50  escudos  ($1.25).  Two  months  ago  five  men  were  taken 
and  “sold”  for  six  months  to  a  planter. 

We  meet  here  the  chief  of  five  villages  including  this  one, 
with  a  total  population  of  about  2,500.  Six  years  ago  a  hundred 
of  them  were  taken  away  to  San  Thome  and  none  ever  came  back. 

A  requisition  for  twenty-six  persons  for  road  work  stands 
against  this  village.  It  is  under  obligation  to  ferry  across  the  river 
gratis  any  soldier  or  government  people  who  come  by.  It  also  has 
to  furnish  men  to  carry  lime  and  tile  for  building  at  the  county 
seat  four  days  from  here.  They  get  only  their  rations. 

We  pass  the  military  post  for  an  area  which  furnishes  at  least 
1,500  workers  on  roads  and  plantations.  A  road  foreman  showed 
us  certain  berries  and  the  seeds  from  certain  pods  with  which  his 
workers  eke  out  their  food  from  home.  They  dare  not  eat  too 
much  of  these  lest  they  become  sick. 

Conditions  South  Of  The  Quanza 

We  now  pass  in  motor  car  to  a  part  of  Angola  about  300  miles 
distant.  On  the  way  we  are  impressed  with  the  extravagance  of 
motor-road  building.  The  road  runs  straight  for  many  miles  and 
at  the  crown  of  a  hill  we  can  see  it  before  us  dropping  into  the 
valley  and  rising  to  the  crown  of  the  next  hill  two  or  three  miles 
away.  Some  heavy  grades  could  have  been  avoided  by  swinging 
around  the  hills  instead  of  driving  straight  ahead  regardless  of 
topography.  The  road  is  at  least  seven  meters  wide  when  it  might 
have  been  made  five  meters  wide  and  afterwards  widened  as  traffic 
warranted  it.  To  clear  of  trees,  grade,  smooth  and  surface  with 
ant-hill  clay  these  broad  strips  imposes  a  crushing  burden  on  natives 
without  picks,  spades,  shovels,  wheel  barrows  or  road  scrapers. 
The  road  never  swerves  for  an  ant  hill,  although  the  removal  in 
baskets  of  an  ant  hill  as  big  as  a  house  is  a  huge  task. 

That  road  building  has  been  overdone  is  evident.  For  many 
hours  we  ride  through  a  wilderness  with  herds  of  game  frequently 
in  sight  and  the  uptrack  on  our  car  is  the  only  track  visible  on  our 
return.  On  this  trip  and  in  146  miles  of  travel  in  the  next  two 
days  I  see  but  one  vehicle  on  the  road  and  it  is  a  car  filled  with 
officials,  including  the  highway  engineer,  going  to  plan  for  addi¬ 
tional  roads!  I  was  told  of  a  good  motor  road  which  leads  only 
to  a  fine  view  on  a  hill  top.  Months  after  its  completion  my  in¬ 
formant  drove  up  and  his  was  the  first  wheel  track  in  it. 


22 


Six  months’  work  for 
taxes. 


None  return  from 
S.  Thome. 


23 

Road  making  overdone. 


Roads  not  used. 


Page  15 


24 


How  The  Labor  System  Works 


Labor  wanted  for 
nothing. 


25 

Police  persecution. 


26 

Children  taken  from 
school. 


Forced  labor  for 
planters. 


27 

Skill  discouraged. 


Slavery  ceased  with  the  downfall  of  the  Portuguese  monarchy 
in  1910  and  the  new  system  began  about  1918.  In  the  interval 
when  Republican  principles  were  supposed  to  prevail,  the 
Portuguese  landholders  constantly  complained  that  the  natives  were 
lqopelessly  lazy,  that  the  planters  could  not  obtain  workers  for 
their  farms;  yet  all  this  time  blacks  thronged  the  mission  estate 
delighted  if  they  could  earn  five  cents  a  day,  skilled  labor  ten 
cents.  Most  Portuguese  thought  they  ought  to  get  labor  for  noth¬ 
ing  or  at  most  for  twenty  cents  a  month,  with  perhaps  two  cents 
worth  of  food  a  day.  Moreover,  on  the  plantation  labor  is  ruth¬ 
lessly  driven.  If  a  mother  lays  a  baby  under  a  tree  and  rises  up 
from  her  work  when  it  cries,  she  may  get  struck  for  it. 

Much  of  the  brutality  from  which  the  natives  suffer  is  inflicted 
by  the  native  police  ( cipaes )  who  are  given  virtual  carte  blanche 
by  their  Portuguese  superiors.  A  year  ago  the  police  came  to 
the  mission,  collected  the  men,  went  to  the  pounding  rocks  where 
the  women  pound  their  manioc  and  had  their  meal  spread  to  dry 
and  took  them  off  to  work  on  the  road  without  even  giving  them 
opportunity  to  gather  up  the  meal  and  carry  it  to  their  homes. 

The  natives  are  much  worse  clad  than  before  the  war.  As 
always  with  a  depreciating  currency,  wages  are  slower  to  rise  than 
prices. 

Children  had  to  quit  the  mission  school  saying,  “Father  has 
been  taken  to  work  on  a  plantation,  mother  and  the  older  brothers 
are  working  on  the  roads,  so  I  must  stay  out  of  school  to  hoe  the 
fields,  pound  the  manioc  into  meal  and  feed  my  little  brothers 
and  sisters.”  Furthermore  the  child  will  have  to  pound  the  meal 
and  carry  it  to  mother  working  on  the  road  with  the  baby  on  her 
back. 

While  I  am  at  the  mission  a  former  pupil  comes  in  and  tells 
how  fifteen  men  of  his  village  have  been  commandeered  by  Gov¬ 
ernment  to  work  on  a  private  plantation.  They  get  15  escudos  a 
month.  The  village  changes  the  force  every  five  weeks.  The 
substitutes  answer  to  the  names  of  the  men  replaced,  so  the  planter 
is  not  aware  of  this  substitution. 

A  carpenter  questioned  tells  that  he  has  given  three  months 
unrequited  work  on  the  buildings  at  the  Post.  No  rations.  He 
was  assisting  a  first  class  native  carpenter  who  worked  for  months 
and  months  without  wages  or  rations.  For  the  industrial  depart¬ 
ment  of  a  mission  school  to  make  a  native  skillful  is  a  doubtful 
kindness,  for  the  skilled  worker  is  likely  to  be  kept  working  for 
nothing  for  the  Government  a  longer  time  than  the  unskilled.  It 
is  harder  to  replace  the  carpenter  when  his  term  is  up  than  the 
hoe  man;  so  they  keep  him  on. 


28  Village  No.  8 

Interviewing  an  intelligent  man  from  it,  we  learn  that  it  has 
about  two  hundred  inhabitants  of  whom  sixty  pay  poll  taxes.  The 
village  is  obliged  to  maintain  six  on  road  work  the  year  around. 
The  elders  decide  who  shall  go.  Eight  have  to  be  kept  on  the 


Page  16 


plantations  where  they  get  50  escudos  ($1.25)  for  three  months’ 
work.  No  pano  or  blanket  is  supplied.  Their  food  is  a  quart  of 
meal  a  day  which  they  must  cook  themselves.  This  being  in¬ 
sufficient,  they  have  to  obtain  food  from  home.  They  work  from  Road  work,  no  pay. 
dark  to  dark  with  two  short  intervals  for  resting  and  eating.  The 
work  is  very  hard  and  the  stick  is  freely  used  if  one  straightens 
up  or  takes  a  moment’s  ease.  The  overseer  is  a  white  man.  After 
working  three  months  some  leave  without  asking  for  the  50  escudos 
due  them,  because  those  who  do  are  at  once  given  another  time 
card  and  required  to  work  another  three  months’  period.  How¬ 
ever,  this  seems  sheer  imposition,  for  when  they  have  taken  their  Cheated  on  time  cards, 
time  cards  to  the  Post  and  asked  whether  they  have  to  work  a 
second  three  months  the  official  has  said  “No.”  But  only  those 
have  gone  to  the  Post  who  took  no  pay.  A  man  may  have  to  put 
in  four  months  before  he  gets  three  months  “written”  on  his  time 
card.  The  planter  seizes  all  manner  of  pretexts  for  not  “writing” 
a  day  that  has  been  worked.  He  will  write  on  four  days  a  week 
when  six  days  have  been  put  in,  saying  “I  can’t  write  every  day 
you  work  for  then  your  period  of  service  would  come  too  quickly 
to  an  end.” 

All  Government  work  yields  no  pay  and  carries  no  rations 
unless  the  laborers  are  sent  far  from  their  homes.  If  the  official 
gives  them  a  shilling  or  two  a  month  each  it  is  understood  as  a 
tip  rather  than  a  wage. 


A  Sizal  Plantation  29 

We  find  230  natives  working  on  a  certain  fazenda  while  400  Forced  labor  for 
more  are  coming  to  help  care  for  the  crop.  They  are  obtained  planters 
directly  from  the  Government  for  a  three  months’  term  and  are 
paid  directly  from  15  to  18  escudos  a  month.  As  ration  they 
get  a  kilo  of  corn  meal  together  with  beans  and  dried  fish. 

The  manager,  a  Boer,  says  the  system  smacks  of  slavery  and  he 
would  prefer  voluntary  labor. 


Work  Gang  E  30 

Thirty  six  miles  from - we  pass  a  road  gang  drawn  A1I  year  obligation. 

from  four  villages.  Two  have  a  quota  of  five  workers  each,  one 
of  six  and  the  other  of  seven.  The  obligation  is  year-round,  or 
until  their  ten  kilometers  of  highway  is  finished.  They  work  from 
sun  to  sun  but  are  not  driven.  The  quotas  of  these  villages  for 
plantation  work  are  ten,  five,  five,  four;  the  term  of  service  is 
three  months  and  the  rations  are  insufficient. 


Village  No.  9  31 

We  remained  overnight  in  this  village  which  has  173  in-  Jta^L&nd  W°rk 
habitants  of  whom  sixty  pay  head  tax.  It  must  keep  five  on  road 
work  and  four  on  plantation  work,  while  eleven  are  in  Loanda  on 
Government  work.  This  is  the  third  batch  which  has  been  fur¬ 
nished  to  Loanda.  They  get  30  escudos  ($.75)  for  their  six 
months’  service  but  have  to  pay  their  head  tax  besides.  Their 
food  is  poor.  One  who  has  been  a  term  in  Loanda  may  be  required 


Page  17 


32 


in  the  same  year  to  work  on  a  plantation,  but  his  village  will  see 
to  it  that  someone  “changes  off”  with  him. 

On  the  plantation  few  seek  any  pay,  for  if  they  ask  for  their 
pay  another  three  months’  time-card  will  be  forced  upon  them. 
Plantation  work  does  not  exempt  them  from  the  head  tax.  To 
raise  this  they  have  to  sell  the  corn,  or  pigs,  or  chickens  their 
wives  have  raised.  The  work  on  the  plantation  stretches  from 
dark  to  dark  and  is  terribly  hard.  The  road  work  sometimes 
interferes  with  their  putting  in  their  crops.  In  recent  years  the 
burden  of  obligatory  work  has  been  getting  heavier. 

Most  of  the  thirty  present  have  about  exhausted  their  store 
of  food,  although  it  will  be  yet  some  months  before  a  new  crop 
is  made.  Several  have  not  paid  their  80  escudos  head  tax  and  to 
raise  the  money  will  have  to  sell  some  of  the  food  needed  to  sustain 
their  families. 

Worse  than  slavery.  We  are  told  that  life  is  getting  harder  for  the  natives.  So 

much  of  their  time  is  taken  that  they  are  not  able  to  look  after 
their  gardens,  houses  and  village  improvements  as  formerly;  nor 
do  they  have  the  income  they  had  when  they  worked  for  real 
wages.  They  are  less  able  to  buy  cloth,  tools  or  utensils.  They 
are  becoming  more  impoverished,  less  able  to  sustain  schools 
and  churches.  Their  lot  is  nearly  that  of  slaves.  One  foreigner 
of  long  residence  in  Angola  says  “This  is  worse  than  slavery.  The 
Portuguese  have  the  benefit  of  the  natives’  unpaid  toil  without  the 
slave  owner’s  responsibility  of  feeding,  clothing  and  caring  for 
the  laborer.” 

Skilled  labor,  no  pay.  On  the  road  we  pass  a  bridge  under  construction.  The  builder, 

an  elderly  native  Christian  of  noble  appearance,  is  so  useful  that 
the  Government  keeps  him  at  work  for  it  without  rations  or  pay 
for  as  much  as  five  months  at  a  time. 

33  Village  No.  10 

This  village  which  has  sixty-three  payers  of  head  tax,  must 
keep  three  men  regularly  on  road  work,  five  men  are  now  working 
for  the  Benguela  Government  and  five  are  on  Government  work 
at  G — .  Those  at  Benguela  may  be  there  six  months  or  a  year  and 
will  get  nothing  but  a  tax  receipt.  Those  at  G —  have  been  called 
for  a  month,  but  when  they  come  back  others  must  take  their 
places.  They  supply  their  own  food  and  will  not  get  even  their 
tax  receipt.  The  men  at  Benguela  work  from  dark  to  dark  and 
are  given  wormy  meal  which  often  brings  on  dysentery.  Labor 
exactions  are  on  the  increase  and  it  is  now  six  years  that  the  pressure 
has  been  getting  worse.  This  district  once  produced  tons  and  tons 
of  rice,  but  this  branch  of  cultivation  has  all  but  died  out  because 
the  labor  requisitions  made  it  impossible  to  care  for  it.  Villages 
deep  in  the  bush  suffer  as  much  from  labor  exactions  as  those 
near.  More  is  required  from  villages  with  skilled  workers  than 
from  those  without  schools.  Hence  parents  hesitate  to  let  their 
boys  learn  a  trade. 

During  our  palaver  we  ask  eleven  men  sitting  in  a  row  “How 
much  forced  labor  have  you  performed  in  the  last  twelve  months?” 


Agriculture 

discouraged. 


No  trades. 


Page  18 


The  replies  are:  two  months,  seven  weeks,  nine  weeks,  three  months, 
two  months,  twenty  weeks,  nine  weeks,  four  months,  eight  weeks, 
seven  weeks,  six  months — in  all  thirty-three  months  or  an  average  of 
three  months.  In  no  case  were  there  rations,  pay  or  tax  receipt. 
Their  wives  not  only  did  road  work  but  had  to  carry  on  their  heads 
to  the  Post,  forty  miles  away,  the  boards  and  planks  their  husbands 
had  sawed  in  the  woods. 


Village  No.  1 1 

This  village,  which  has  one  hundred  twenty  persons  who  pay  the 
head  tax,  keeps  fifteen  on  the  road  force,  twenty-nine  work  at  the 
Post,  and  thirteen  are  maintained  in  Loanda  on  Government  work. 
Six  had  just  returned  from  six  months’  plantation  work  having  got 
nothing  although  they  toiled  from  dark  to  dark.  Their  food,  a 
plate  of  meal  a  day,  was  not  over  half  of  what  was  necessary.  The 
Loanda  workers  got  enough  to  pay  their  taxes,  but  not  the  others. 
Those  on  plantations  had  to  take  a  second  three  months’  time¬ 
card,  although  they  applied  for  no  wages  on  the  first  time-card. 
The  planter  says  he  has  paid  the  Post  for  them,  but  never  tells 
how  much.  Not  a  little  of  their  labor  is  stolen  from  them  by 
the  plantation.  They  get  credit  for  only  three  or  four  days  work 
in  the  week  even  when  they  have  put  in  six  days;  so  it  takes 
four  or  five  months  to  fill  a  three  months’  time-card.  If  a  man 
asks  why  yesterday  was  not  “written,”  he  gets  a  cut  of  the  whip 
with  the  remark  “What  business  is  it  of  yours?  I’ll  write  what 
I  please.”  On  Sundays  they  work  until  noon,  although  this  is 
never  credited  on  the  time-card. 

I  ask  twelve  men  as  to  the  amount  of  forced  labor  they  have 
performed  in  the  last  twelve  months.  No.  1,  having  lately  finished 
a  six-year  term  as  a  soldier,  is  not  on  the  service  list  but  he  helps 
on  the  road  work;  No.  2,  has  put  in  thirteen  weeks;  No.  3,  seven 
weeks;  No.  4,  nine  weeks;  No.  5,  seven  weeks;  No.  6,  eleven  weeks; 
No.  7,  six  months  in  Loanda  and  four  weeks  on  the  road  going 
and  returning;  No.  8,  six  months  as  mason,  receiving  for  service 
35  escudos  and  four  yards  of  cloth.  Then  he  put  in  two  months 
on  Government  work  and  on  the  plantations;  No.  9,  twelve  weeks; 
No.  10,  eleven  weeks;  No.  11,  nine  weeks;  No.  12,  thirteen  weeks. 
All  had  to  pay  the  head  tax  besides.  Those  who  report  a  short 
term— such  as  seven  weeks — may  have  been  sick  or  in  the  employ  of 
a  white  man.  Omitting  the  discharged  soldier,  the  eleven  men 
had  156  weeks  of  unrequited  labor,  or  an  average  of  14  145  weeks 
each. 

The  Chief  of  the  Post  here  demanded  workers  for  plantations. 
Among  those  who  responded  were  two  skilled  workmen.  They 
said  “We  would  prefer  to  work  for  the  Government  at  our  trade 
rather  than  wield  the  hoe  for  the  planter.”  He  replied  “I  did  not 
send  for  skilled  workmen  and  I  don’t  want  them.  I  want  only 
men  who  can  hoe.”  How  much  incentive  can  a  native  have  to 
acquire  skill  when  the  authorities  take  this  attitude? 

An  elderly  carpenter  and  early  mission  convert,  remembers 
well  when  some  of  the  planters  had  hundreds  of  slaves.  I  ask  “Are 


Average  three  months’ 
forced  labor. 


34 


Taxes. 


Labor  stolen. 


Periods  of  forced  labor. 


35 

Skill  not  wanted. 


Page  19 


Better  off  as  slaves. 


No  trades. 


No  escape. 


Beatings. 


36 


Cheated  on  time  cards. 


Unpaid  toil  for  two  or 
three  months. 


conditions  for  your  people  better  than  they  used  to  be  or  worse?” 
He  replies:  “Twelve  years  ago  when  there  was  slavery  the  slaves 
had  all  the  hardships  while  the  free  negroes  were  not  badly  off. 
Now  we  are  all  slaves.  The  slaves  were  better  fed  than  we  forced 
laborers  are  for  we  are  not  property.”  There  is  little  effort  on 
the  part  of  the  authorities  to  spread  their  exactions  evenly  among 
the  native  males.  The  skilled  are  retained  at  unpaid  labor 
much  longer  than  the  unskilled.  Hence  boys  shrink  from  learn¬ 
ing  carpentry  and  masonry  for  fear  of  being  kept  longer  at  unpaid 
labor.  Migration  affords  no  relief  to  the  blacks  for  the  headman 
of  a  village  will  be  jailed  when  any  of  its  inscribed  tax  payers  are 
not  produced.  The  Chief  will  say  “Where  is  Josia?”  “He’s 
moved  away.”  “Well,  you  find  him  or  someone  to  take  his  place. 
He  is  on  my  books  and  he  had  no  permission  to  leave.”  So  the 
headman  is  jailed  until  Josia  appears.  The  natives  are  held  in 
a  net  of  strong  mesh. 

I  saw  the  hands  of  the  village  headman  all  swollen  from  the 
infliction  of  the  palmatorio.  For  hours  he  has  been  holding 
them  in  hot  water  to  reduce  the  swelling.  He  was  beaten  yester¬ 
day  because  he  failed  to  present  at  the  Post  the  leaving  road 
gang  at  the  same  time  he  presented  the  new  road  gang.  On  the 
plantations  the  labor  recruits  sample  the  palmatorio  and  the  chicote, 
or  hippohide  whip.  They  get  the  lash  even  if  they  straighten  up 
a  bit  to  rest  their  backs;  the  hoes  must  be  in  action  all  the  time. 


Village  No.  12 

The  population  is  382,  one  hundred  pay  head  tax.  For  the 
moment  these  villagers  are  not  on  road  work.  Their  job  has  been 
sawing  out  boards  for  the  Government  by  hand.  Six  were  kept  on 
this  for  four  months.  Four  men  have  been  on  the  six  months’ 
term  in  Loanda,  while  a  quota  of  four  must  be  kept  working  at 
the  Post.  These  are  “spelled”  every  month.  None  are  on  planta¬ 
tions  now  but  five  was  the  village  quota.  Plantation  work  is  so  hard 
that  these  are  “spelled”  every  fortnight.  On  the  plantation  the  day 
is  from  dark  to  dark.  Half  a  day’s  work  is  exacted  on  Sunday 
but  not  credited.  They  work  six  days  a  week  but  never  are  the  full 
six  credited  on  the  card.  Hence,  it  takes  five  or  six  months  to 
fill  out  a  three  months’  time-card.  When  they  get  their  time-card 
they  work  the  first  week  for  nothing  to  pay  for  the  “cost”  of  the 
time-card.  Only  one  of  the  five  Portuguese  planters  in  this  region 
“writes”  every  day  worked.  After  the  time-card  is  filled  the 
planter  requires  the  man  to  work  an  extra  fortnight.  If  the  victim 
protests,  the  planter  will  tear  up  the  filled  time-card  and  give 
him  a  new  one  which  must  be  worked  full.  Their  rations  are  very 
insufficient — a  handful  of  meal  and  one  of  unhulled  rice.  They 
do  not  more  than  half  suffice,  so  that  the  men  have  to  obtain  sup¬ 
plies  from  home.  One  planter,  however,  gives  each  worker  eight 
yards  of  cloth.  The  headmen  judge  that  the  unrequited  toil  of  a 
year  averages  two  and  a  half  to  three  months,  feeding  and  clothing 
themselves  and  paying  their  taxes  besides. 


Page  20 


The  Region  About  Silva  Porto 

The  field  of  inquiry  now  shifts  to  villages  150  to  250  miles 
away,  reached  from  other  centers. 

From  inquiries  we  learn  that  the  traders  influence  powerfully 
the  conduct  of  the  officials.  The  native  will  do  anything,  pay 
anything,  rather  than  take  his  cause  into  court.  However  good 
his  case,  he  will  not  seek  justice  unless  he  has  the  support  of  a 
white  man.  His  experience  makes  him  regard  Government  and 
courts  all  as  a  white  man’s  affair,  in  which  he  has  no  faith.  Count¬ 
ing  on  the  native’s  distrust  of  the  officials  and  judges,  the  trader 
feels  safe  in  venturing  on  almost  any  outrage  and  extortion.  One 
trader  burnt  a  village  at  night  and  tied  up  all  the  people  he  could 
catch  supposing  (mistakenly)  that  a  man  of  this  village  had  robbed 
him.  None  of  his  victims  will  complain  of  this  at  the  Fort.  They 
fear  being  sent  to  San  Thome.  They  simply  have  no  confidence 
in  the  Government. 

Although  the  law  makes  praiseworthy  provisions  for  the 
acquisition  and  conservation  of  property  by  the  native,  he  has  in 
fact  no  property  rights  as  against  the  white  man,  because  the 
Government  affords  him  no  protection.  Although  the  law  will 
reserve  five  hectares  for  any  native  family,  the  white  man  can  take 
a  concession  which  engulfs  a  native  village  and  all  its  holdings. 

Decree  No.  40 — was  prompted  by  the  feeling  that  something 
must  be  done  here  to  placate  outside  public  opinion.  The  decree 
exists  only  on  paper,  not  in  reality. 

On  one  occasion  I  talked  with  a  group  of  intelligent  black  men 
from  villages  as  much  as  150  miles  apart. 

Village  No.  13 

This  village,  which  has  three  hundred  inhabitants,  of  whom 
one  hundred  and  ten  pay  taxes,  has  to  maintain  at  the  Post  three 
carpenters  who  work  six  months,  each  furnishing  his  own  tools  and 
food.  They  asked  for  wages  but  got  nothing  but  receipts  for  their 
taxes.  Their  successors  did  not  even  get  that  much.  This  illus¬ 
trates  the  caprice  of  officials.  The  village  must  keep  going  two 
sawyers  who  furnish  their  own  saw  and  food,  get  no  pay  and  are 
“spelled”  every  fortnight.  Then  they  have  to  provide  the  Post  the 
year  round  with  twenty  common  laborers  who  get  nothing.  For 
a  month  twenty  men  had  to  be  furnished  for  building  bridges. 
The  Chief  petitioned  for  pay  for  them  but  without  result.  Again, 
the  village  was  assigned  a  stretch  of  road  and  all  hands  worked  on  it 
six  weeks  from  dark  to  dark  under  a  native  policeman  who  used 
freely  on  them  his  hippo  whip.  They  fed  themselves  and  some 
were  too  tired  at  night  even  to  get  fire-wood  to  keep  them  warm 
through  the  night.  Again  the  policeman  took  thirty  men  from  this 
village  for  work  on  the  railway.  For  their  year’s  work  they  get  a 
blanket  and  10  escudos  each.  The  village  paid  their  taxes  for 
them.  Being  under  an  Englishman  they  were  well  fed  and  well 
treated.  Finally  the  village  had  to  furnish  two  policemen  for 
whom  is  provided  food,  clothing  and  taxes.  The  Chief  remarked 
“because  we  are  connected  with  the  Mission  schools,  we  have 


37 

No  faith  in  courts. 


Government  no 
protection. 


Paper  laws. 


38 


At  the  mercy  of 
officials. 


Page  21 


been  much  better  treated  than  the  heathen  villages.”  He  says  the 
past  year  has  been  the  worst  he  has  ever  known,  nor  are  they  so 
well  fed  and  clad  as  they  used  to  be.  He  recounts  that  a  trader 
came  and  built  right  by  the  village  with  no  regard  to  the  owner¬ 
ship  of  the  land.  Although  he  has  no  authorization  he  makes 
them  furnish  him  with  carriers  and  pays  them  nothing.  The  Post 
affords  the  natives  no  protection  from  such  labor  thieves. 

39 

Village  No.  14 

Brutality. 

Inhabitants  150,  taxpayers  forty-four.  The  Chief  says  that 
the  village  had  to  furnish  a  skilled  worker  for  six  months,  then 
two  had  to  be  provided.  The  man  who  was  the  best  carpenter 
in  the  district  furnished  his  own  tools  and  food  and  got  nothing, 
not  even  a  tax  receipt.  Informed  that  his  wife  was  sick  he  obtained 
a  day’s  leave  to  go  home.  Finding  her  in  childbirth  and  with  no 
one  but  a  little  girl  to  help  her  he  outstayed  his  leave  one  day. 
A  cipaio  came,  tied  him  up,  and  brought  him  to  the  Post  where 
the  Administrador  had  him  given  a  severe  beating  with  the  pal- 
matorio  and  thrown  into  the  prison.  Next  morning  early  the 
Chief  saw  them  bring  this  man  out  of  prison  with  his  hands  too 
swollen  to  close,  give  him  a  hoe  and  set  him  to  work  on  the  road. 
An  armed  cipaio  stood  over  him  and  kept  him  steadily  at  work. 
He  was  weak  from  lack  of  food  and  could  hold  the  hoe  handle 

Hunger. 

only  between  thumb  and  palm. 

The  village  was  required  to  keep  seven  continuously  on  road 
work,  “spelled”  every  two  weeks.  Both  men  and  women  worked 
under  a  cipaio  who  had  a  chicote,  days  very  long.  Besides  this 
the  whole  village  was  out  about  a  month  working  on  the  roads. 
This  corvee  is  one  of  the  chief  reasons  why  in  some  villages  people 
are  dying  of  hunger.  The  authorities  pay  no  attention  to  the  re¬ 
quirements  of  the  native  crops.  They  may  be  called  out  just  when 
the  rice  is  ripe  so  that  in  their  absence  the  birds  get  it. 

40 

In  1923  two  traders  near  here  wanted  carriers  to  convey  their 
goods  to  railhead  at  Chinguar.  They  simply  sent  to  the  Post,  each 
asking  for  ten  carriers.  The  loads  they  gave  out  were  forty-five 
kilos  each,  so  the  village  had  to  furnish  double  the  number  of 
carriers  and  divide  the  loads.  The  carriers  were  taken  to  the  white 

Laws  a  dead  letter. 

man  by  a  cipaio.  No  food  was  provided.  They  asked  for  pay 
and  were  told  “This  is  on  government  requisition  and  no  pay  goes 
with  it.”  Thus  forty  carriers  were  done  out  of  their  time  for 
thirty  days  each,  for  they  made  two  round  trips.  The  law  lays 
down  that  forced  workers  shall  be  paid.  Foreigners  are  required 
to  pay  the  wages  in  the  presence  of  the  Administrador  but  for  the 
Portuguese  this  clause  of  the  law  is  a  dead  letter  and  they  help 
themselves  freely  to  native  labor. 

Some  good  fortune. 

Village  No.  15 

Inhabitants  300,  tax  payers  seventy-three.  It  lies  75  miles  to 
the  south  in  a  newly  opened  territory  where  there  are  no  important 
traders  or  planters.  For  three  months  it  had  to  keep  eight  men 
felling  and  sawing  trees  for  the  Government.  This  year  no  road 

Page  22 


work  has  been  required  of  them  and  no  service  for  private  in¬ 
dividuals.  Neighboring  villages  are  equally  fortunate. 


Village  No.  16 


41 


The  horn  was  blown  when  we  reached  this  village  at  high 
noon  and  soon  the  people  came  trooping  into  the  school  house 
each  with  his  little  stool.  About  thirty  were  present  besides 
children.  The  inhabitants  are  about  200  in  number,  tax  payers 
sixty-six.  A  policeman  will  come  to  the  village  with  an  order  for 
so  many  men  to  work  at  Silva  Porto,  the  Post.  There  they  are 
assigned  to  various  people  who  wish  servants — hotel  keepers, 
traders,  residents.  They  serve  six  months,  get  their  food  but  no 
clothes  and  are  paid  enough  to  equal  their  head  tax.  Generally 
the  work  is  hard,  the  hours  are  long,  and  the  whip  is  used.  At 
the  end  of  six  months  the  village  sends  a  replacing  gang.  The 
year  around  ten  must  be  maintained  in  this  service.  Then  six, 
chiefly  boys  and  girls,  work  from  dark  to  dark  on  the  highway 
under  a  policeman  with  a  whip.  They  are  changed  every  three 
or  four  weeks.  Ten  men  from  this  village  serve  for  a  year  on  a 
plantation,  at  the  end  of  which  they  get  six  yards  of  the  cheapest 
calico.  No  money,  no  tax  receipt.  No  time-card  is  used.  This 
plantation  work  is  a  recent  development  and  has  been  worse  this 
year  than  ever  before. 

In  general  the  skilled  worker  is  not  let  go  at  all  from  forced 
labor.  Just  now  no  one  from  the  village  is  on  Government  work. 
Following  the  abrupt  abandonment  of  the  ambitious  construction 
policy  of  the  late  High  Commissioner  Sr.  Norton  De  Matos,  there 
has  been  a  great  reduction  in  public  work. 

Inquiry  reveals  that  the  men  in  the  front  row  have  worked 
altogether  forty-nine  months  in  the  last  year  or  an  average  of 
nearly  5  months.  One  got  two  yards  of  cheap  calico;  two  got  six 
yards  each;  two  got  tax  receipts  and  one  was  paid  about  two 
shillings. 

I  asked,  “Why  don’t  you  protest  against  such  treatment?”  The 
school  teacher  stated  that  he  had  complained  to  the  secretary  of 
the  administration  of  the  blackmailing  of  the  villagers  by  the 
policemen.  That  official  promptly  flared  up  and  said,  “Get  out  of 
here!  It’s  none  of  your  business  what  the  authorities  do.”  Al¬ 
though  these  policemen  are  under  no  supervision  in  their  dealings 
with  the  villagers,  the  authorities  will  harken  to  no  complaints 
against  them.  Thanks  to  this  the  cipaio  sometimes  makes  money 
faster  then  a  successful  trader.  He  is  given  an  order  to  comb  out 
so  many  men  from  the  district,  but  it  is  within  his  discretion  how 
many  shall  be  required  of  a  particular  village.  So  under  threat 
of  being  tied  up  the  villagers  compete  in  bribing  him  not  to  hit 
them  too  hard.  He  demands  men  even  of  villages  all  of  whose 
able-bodied  men  are  away  on  duty.  In  order  to  avoid  being  beaten 
they  will  have  to  pay  him.  Thus  a  cipaio  rakes  in  money,  corn, 
sheep,  goats  and  chickens  until  sometimes  not  a  domestic  animal 
is  left  in  the  village.  The  cipaio  is  often  a  criminal  or  a  bad 
character  and  his  field  of  operation  is  always  a  strange  tribe,  pre- 


Work  at  the  Post. 


Recent  reduction 
in  public  work. 


42 

Pay  for  five  months. 


Police  oppression. 


Page  23 


43 


Depopulation. 


44 

An  exempted  village. 


Forced  loans. 


ferably  one  with  which  his  tribe  is  at  enmity.  The  Portuguese 
have  been  very  skillful  in  playing  off  one  tribe  against  another  so 
as  to  use  the  black  man  in  carrying  out  the  white  man’s  evil  pur¬ 
pose.  We  were  told  that  in  the  eastern  part  of  Angola  the  un¬ 
expected  appearance  of  a  strange  white  man  in  the  village  is  a 
signal  for  the  precipitate  abandonment  of  huts  and  firesides. 
Across  the  frontier  in  the  Belgian-Congo  such  panic  is  unknown. 

The  Rhodesian  and  Belgian-Congo  borders  of  Angola  are 
becoming  depopulated.  Last  year  within  ten  miles  of  Chisamba 
there  was  a  shrinkage  of  600  taxpayers  (1,500  inhabitants)  owing 
to  the  natives  striving  to  put  themselves  out  of  reach  of  the  Portu¬ 
guese.  Most  moved  east  and  northeast  into  the  less  “civilized” 
areas  where  they  would  be  less  harassed  by  taxes  and  requisitions. 

According  to  law  a  native  working  for  himself  is  not  to  be  called 
upon  to  render  service.  I  have  never  heard  of  a  case  of  exemp¬ 
tion  on  this  account  but  now  I  come  upon  such  an  instance.  One 
village  engaged  in  market  gardening  and  growing  wheat  and  rice 
is  so  esteemed  for  its  excellent  produce  that  it  is  not  called  upon 
to  furnish  workers  for  the  state.  Some  administradors,  on  the 
other  hand,  in  planting  time  call  out  the  whole  village  on  highway 
work  with  the  express  intention  of  making  the  native  come  to 
depend  entirely  on  employment  by  the  white  man,  of  converting 
him  into  proletarian. 

The  time  of  payment  of  taxes  plays  into  the  hands  of  the  white 
trader.  The  tax  is  due  just  before  the  natives’  crops  are  ripe;  so 
that  the  greatest  possible  number  are  obliged  to  borrow  under 
extremely  hard  conditions.  Some  traders  require  six  months  labor 
for  paying  a  man’s  tax. 

February  last,  a  missionary  met  on  the  road  a  body  of  400 
natives  going  down  to  the  coast  to  work  for  the  planter  who  had 
paid  their  taxes  and  given  each  a  “cloth.”  About  the  same  time 
he  met  700  men,  tax  delinquents,  being  conducted  to  Malange  to 
work  for  these  planters  who  had  advanced  the  money  for  their 
taxes.  Such  work  does  not  in  the  least  exempt  them  from  the 
regular  annual  stint  of  unpaid  work  for  the  government. 


45  A  mission  physician  states: 

No  medical  service.  The  Colonial  Medical  Department  has  a  very  comprehensive  plan  for 

meeting  the  medical  needs  of  the  natives,  but  it  has  not  been  put  into 
effect.  There  are  only  a  few  Portuguese  medical  men  in  the  interior,  and 
these  are  very  widely  scattered.  Their  attention  is  chiefly  taken  up  with 
white  practice  and  in  general  medical  help  is  not  available  to  the  native. 

There  are  very  few  dispensaries  where  medicine  is  available  for  pay  and 
almost  no  free  medicine. 

In  recent  epidemics  of  smallpox  and  influenza  with  a  high  mortality 
rate  no  relief  measures  were  undertaken  that  I  know  of  on  the  part  of  the 
Government.  Heavy  duties  are  charged  on  medicines  imported  by  the 
missions  for  their  free  dispensaries. 

One  day  in  January  I  visited  a  native  village  in  the  famine  district. 
While  I  was  there  two  men  died  of  starvation,  and  at  the  same  time  a 
cipaio  was  there  collecting  laborers! 


Page  21* 


Village  No.  17 

In  this  village  owing  to  the  presence  of  a  native  policeman 
we  made  no  inquiries  as  to  forced  labor.  However,  we  came 
upon  a  recent  instance  of  the  authorities  dealing  out  justice.  A 
policeman  came  to  this  and  other  villages  and  made  them  give 
him  two  pigs  for  his  clothes.  The  village  head  man  took  the 
matter  to  the  Post,  the  Commandant  called  the  policemen  in  and 
they  picked  out  the  guilty  man,  his  extortions  were  proven  on 
him  and  the  villagers  got  their  pigs  back. 

Village  No.  18 

This  is  a  village  containing  eighty  taxpayers  about  which  we 
learned  from  the  native  teacher.  Policemen  constantly  come  to 
the  village  for  workers  and  keep  adding  to  the  number  demanded. 
Then  if  the  people  do  not  provide  as  many  as  they  demand  the 
policemen  blackmail  them  or  maltreat  them.  Some  of  these  work¬ 
ers  are  taken  to  the  Post  to  make  roads  or  to  build  houses  and  get 
neither  food  nor  pay.  Some  are  worked  by  traders  or  planters 
from  whom  they  receive  not  even  food.  Forty  people  at  a  time 
are  called  for  road  building  and  this  quota  is  kept  at  work  until 
the  job  is  finished.  This  year  the  work  lasted  three  months.  The 
policeman  is  given  a  warrant  for  a  certain  number  of  workers, 
but  the  apportioning  of  this  burden  among  the  villages  is  left  to 
him.  By  gifts  the  villages  compete  to  ingratiate  themselves  with 
the  policeman. 

Near  the  village  are  two  plantations.  Some  work  on  the 
plantations  voluntarily  but  if  not  enough  volunteers  show  up, 
others  are  requisitioned.  If  they  find  themselves,  they  get  four 
yards  of  calico  for  six  weeks’  labor;  if  fed,  they  get  the  calico  in 
ten  weeks.  They  are  well  treated  and  not  beaten. 

A  requisitioned  laborer  has  to  serve  three  months  on  the  planta¬ 
tion.  There  are  no  time  cards  except  for  tax  delinquents  or  those 
who  are  working  out  a  debt.  Those  with  time-cards  have  labor 
stolen  from  them,  because  not  all  the  days  worked  are  “written.” 
One  who  has  toiled  three  months  on  the  plantation  is  not  exempt 
from  taxes  or  road  work.  The  teacher  judges  that  the  average  man 
has  to  give  three  months  of  forced  labor  in  the  year.  Only  labor 
on  plantations  is  remunerated. 


Village  No.  19 

Inhabitants,  ISO;  taxpayers,  forty.  The  Christian  elder  says 
that  thirty  men  requisitioned  by  the  Post  were  turned  over  to  work 
six  months  for  a  neighboring  planter.  They  were,  in  fact,  worked 
thirteen  months  and  got  only  25  escudos,  no  tax  receipt.  Last 
June  the  authorities  made  inquiry  at  the  village  with  regard  to  the 
food  and  the  wages  of  these  men.  Then  the  planter  left  the  men 
free  to  go  home  and  began  to  pay  30  escudos  a  month.  It  was  his 
practice  to  compel  the  men,  by  threatening  them  with  the  pal- 
matorio,  to  work  on  Sunday — which  is  against  the  law.  Nineteen 
men  are  constantly  at  work  for  another  planter  to  extinguish  their 


Justice! 


Police  exactions. 


On  plantations. 


47 


48 


Peonage. 


Page  25 


A  happy  village. 


49 


Labor  stolen. 


50 


Outrages  unreported. 


indebtedness  to  him.  Their  wages  do  little  more  than  to  pay  their 
head  tax,  so  they  make  no  progress  in  extricating  themselves  from 
debt.  Their  lot  is  pure  peonage.  The  village  regularly  supplies 
three  men  for  highway  work  under  a  cipaio.  They  are  changed 
every  month. 

Village  No.  20 

Inhabitants,  800;  taxpayers,  three  hundred.  Our  informant, 
a  Christian  elder,  declares  that,  owing  to  a  certain  powerful  local 
influence,  which  it  is  best  not  to  describe  here,  these  villagers  are 
practically  exempt  from  forced  labor,  and  there  is  little  road  work. 
“We  have  a  peaceful  time,  we  are  able  to  work  in  our  gardens 
without  interference,  and  the  village  is  making  improvement.” 

Village  No.  21 

Inhabitans,  100;  tax  payers,  twenty-five.  From  this  tiny  village 
eight  men  were  called  to  the  Post.  Two  worked  nine  months  on 
the  road — and  found  themselves;  two  helped  build  the  new  Post. 
The  work  lasted  three  months  and  they  were  changed  every  month. 
Two  worked  two  months  for  traders;  no  food,  but  10  escudos  pay. 
Two  worked  for  the  wireless  station  five  months — one  getting  9 
escudos  a  month,  the  other  5.  When  those  workers  who  had 
received  nothing  asked  for  pay,  they  were  cudgelled.  The  Chief 
of  Post  was  allowed  a  certain  sum  for  labor  in  building  the  Post, 
but  he  put  it  into  his  pocket  and  the  workers  got  nothing.  Sus¬ 
picion  was  excited  by  his  acquiring  a  motor  cycle  and  an  auto¬ 
mobile  in  the  same  year  and  he  was  dismissed. 

Village  No.  22 

Inhabitants,  200;  tax  payers,  fifty.  According  to  our  inform¬ 
ant,  a  Christian  elder,  they  had  to  provide  men  on  the  road  gang 
for  two  months.  Five  were  requisitioned  for  private  work  at  L — 
about  three  hundred  miles  away.  The  term  was  to  be  nine  months, 
but  eleven  months  had  passed  and  they  had  not  returned.  Occasion¬ 
ally  they  furnish  a  carrier,  but  this  is  all.  When  the  policeman 
comes  for  men,  they  bribe  him  to  let  them  off. 

Sunday  we  attended  religious  services  in  a  large  native  village, 
about  600  being  present.  In  the  after-conference  thirty-six  men 
from  nine  villages  were  present  and  the  following  facts  came  out. 

Village  No.  23 

Inhabitants,  120;  tax  payers,  thirty-five.  This  year  the  Post 
has  made  no  call  for  workers  and  there  has  been  very  little  road¬ 
work.  But  the  local  trader  required  ten  men  to  build  for  him  a 
month.  He  provided  no  food  but  paid  each  25  escudos.  He  beat 
the  elder  of  the  village  with  the  palmatorio  if  there  was  not  prompt 
replacement  of  any  of  the  ten  who  did  not  show  up.  When  the 
job  was  finished  he  maliciously  burned  the  goods  of  the  men  who 
had  been  working  for  him,  because  some  had  dropped  out  of  the 
gang.  Their  failure  to  bring  these  outrages  to  the  attention  of  the 
authorities  shows  how  little  faith  the  natives  have  in  official  justice. 


Page  2G 


So  often  have  they  been  insulted  and  beaten  when  they  made  com¬ 
plaint  that  they  bear  their  wrongs  rather  than  report  them  to  the 
official.  We  are  told  that  if  the  native  has  the  knowledge  and 
means  to  get  his  cause  before  a  regular  court,  he  may  get  justice, 
for  the  judges  are  often  more  or  less  at  odds  with  the  administrative 
officials. 


Village  No.  24 

Inhabitants,  110;  tax  payers,  twenty-five.  Five  men  must  be 
kept  on  the  road  work  all  the  year.  They  are  changed  every  month 
and  are  constantly  beaten  by  the  black  foreman.  At  times  many 
women  and  girls  are  called  out  to  work  on  the  highway.  The  sur¬ 
veyor  of  the  Angola  States  Company  has  an  order  from  the  Post 
which  enables  him  to  have  three  men  regularly  from  this  village, 
ostensibly  for  road  work,  but  actually  working  for  the  surveyor  on 
his  private  possessions.  One  worked  seven  months  for  a  tax  receipt 
and  four  yards  of  thin  calico,  the  other  two  are  changed  monthly. 


Village  No.  25 

Inhabitants,  300;  tax  payers,  eighty.  Four  are  maintained  on 
road  work,  changed  every  month.  The  local  trader  requires  two 
men  to  work  for  him  three  months.  He  promised  them  food  and 
30  escudos  a  month  to  the  stronger  and  25  escudos  to  the  weaker. 
At  the  end  of  the  month  one  of  the  workers  found  a  substitute.  No 
wages  were  paid  him  and  it  is  not  yet  certain  that  there  is  any  pay 
in  this  job. 


Village  No.  26 

Inhabitants,  300;  tax  payers,  fifty.  Only  three  are  at  the  Fort 
working  out  their  taxes.  One  man  has  to  be  kept  on  the  road  force 
and  he  is  changed  every  month.  No  plantation  work. 

Two  months  ago  an  investigator  was  sent  down  from  Loanda 
to  look  into  affairs  here.  Probably  this  investigation  was  instigated 
by  the  traders  and  directed  against  the  humane  Administrador. 

But  the  traders  and  planters  were  themselves  investigated  as 
to  their  treatment  of  the  natives.  The  investigator,  an  army  Captain 
in  civil  service  had  the  idealism  of  Decree  40  and  talked  to  the 
chief  as  man  to  man.  He  told  the  chief  that  they  had  better  work 
on  their  own  fields  of  rice  and  corn  if  they  had  any.  If  they  had 
none  by  all  means  let  them  work  for  the  planter,  but  the  planter 
must  provide  good  meal,  fish  and  palm  oil  and  clothe  the  workers. 
As  soon  as  the  investigator’s  coming  was  known  some  of  the  alarmed 
officials  began  to  pass  out  blankets  and  clothes  liberally  in  order 
to  make  the  natives’  testimony  friendly.  The  Captain  advised  the 
chief  to  give  no  workers  save  misdemeanants  to  the  coast  or  other 
remote  centres.  It  was  the  great  number  from  this  quarter  sent  to 
Loanda  which  made  the  higher  officials  there  suspicious  of  con¬ 
ditions  in  the  Bihe  region.  The  outcome  of  this  investigation  is 
not  yet  known. 


Labor  stolen. 


No  wages. 


51 


An  investigation. 


Page  27 


52 


A  Plantation 


A  planter’s  ideals. 


53 

Exactions. 


54 


The  planter’s  practice. 


Three  villages  die  out. 


We  visit  Sr.  M—  who  has  an  estate  of  upwards  of  25,000  acres, 
much  of  it  in  a  high  state  of  cultivation.  He  has  five  hundred 
workers  on  his  place  and  says  he  pays  20  escudos  a  month  and 
food.  He  urges  the  universal  education  of  the  blacks,  largely  along 
industrial  lines,  as  the  best  means  of  uplifting  them.  Until  this 
transformation  has  been  effected  forced  labor  will  be  necessary  but 
it  should  not  exceed  one  hundred  and  twenty  days  a  year  and  it 
should  always  be  paid  for. 

Village  No.  27 

In  conference  here  with  about  forty  men  we  learn  that  this 
“country”  has  eighteen  villages  inhabited  by  from  3,000  to  4,000 
people.  A  year  ago  the  assistant  secretary  of  the  administration, 
who  was  going  about  listing  tax  payers,  selected  at  random  thirty- 
five  men  from  this  “country”  to  be  sent  to  L — ,  two  hundred  miles 
away  for  six  months’  plantation  work.  A  year  has  passed  and  none 
have  come  back.  Eighty  from  this  “country”  are  required  to  work 
at  the  Post  and  they  change  every  three  months.  Some  get  food, 
but  many  do  not.  Then  the  exactions  of  road  work  are  very  heavy. 
When  Mr.  W—  was  here  last  January  the  policeman  had  a  warrant 
for  one  hundred  to  work  on  the  highway.  Then  along  came  an¬ 
other  cipaio  with  a  warrant  for  thirty  more.  These,  of  course, 
got  nothing  save  the  lash. 


Village  No.  28 

Six  men  from  this  village  have  for  six  months  been  working 
for  a  planter  at  the  Post.  They  got  a  pano,  a  shirt,  a  blanket,  a  tax 
receipt,  and  expect  some  escudos  when  they  are  through.  Their 
rations  being  insufficient,  they  have  to  be  supplemented  by  the 
village.  When  they  return,  others  must  take  their  place.  As  for 
road  work  it  does  not  amount  to  much. 

From  the  fourteen  villages  from  this  “country”  (5,000  inhab¬ 
itants),  one  hundred  men  have  to  be  furnished  to  that  Sr.  M — ,  the 
planter,  we  called  on  yesterday.  They  are  worked  at  a  hard  pace 
from  sunrise  to  sunset  with  from  one  to  one  and  one-half  hours 
rest  at  mid-day.  For  twelve  months  of  this  they  receive  food, 
shirt,  pano  and  tax  receipt,  but  no  money.  Many  run  away  but  are 
caught  and  brought  back  to  work  out  the  value  of  the  goods  they 
have  received. 

Ten  years  ago  conditions  were  much  better  then  they  are 
to-day.  Prices  have  gone  up  much  faster  than  wages.  The  requisi¬ 
tions  do  not  leave  them  enough  time  properly  to  irrigate  and  till 
their  fields. 

In  two  years  the  three  villages  in  this  area  nearest  the  planters 
have  died  out.  At  the  time  of  wheat  or  rice  harvest  the  planters 
obliged  even  women  and  children  to  work  in  their  fields  for  a  little 
salt  or  a  present  to  the  village  headman.  This  amounts  to  about  a 
month  of  labor. 


Page  28 


Village  No.  29 


55 


Inhabitants,  200;  tax  payers,  forty.  The  head  man  says  this 
village  is  not  required  to  furnish  workers  at  the  Post  for  the  head¬ 
man  is  close  to  the  chief  of  this  “country.”  Their  road  service  is  not 
heavy.  Six  villagers  are  working  voluntarily  for  planters,  and  are 
satisfied  with  their  pay.  The  easy  conditions  in  this  and  other 
villages  of  this  district  are  due  to  the  favorable  attitude  of  the  last 
two  ad  mini  str  adores.  When  complaints  are  brought  to  them  they 
give  the  native  a  hearing.  They  treat  the  natives  with  such  respect 
that  they  are  not  liked  by  the  traders  and  planters. 

The  chief  of  a  “country”  explains  to  us  how  labor  is  em¬ 
bezzled.  When  a  man  runs  away  from  a  planter,  his  village,  of 
course,  must  provide  a  substitute.  The  weeks  that  the  absconder  has 
worked  are  not  credited  to  the  village.  The  substitute  is  bound  to 
serve  six  months.  Should  he  quit  before  the  term  is  up,  his  substi¬ 
tute  has  to  serve  for  six  months.  Here  is  one  more  trick  of  the 
labor  thieves.  The  native  foreman  steals  labor  by  having  some  of 
the  men  under  him  work  on  his  garden  or  field  instead  of  for  his 
employer.  This  working  time  does  not  lessen  the  amount  of  service 
that  the  planter  exacts.  The  victimized  laborer  does  not  know  that 
his  toil  is  being  embezzled  by  the  rascally  foreman. 

In  1923  the  secretary  from  the  Post  summoned  this  chief  and 
another  and  said,  “You  must  give  Sr.  M —  one  hundred  men,  the 
other  chief  must  furnish  one  hundred  and  fifty.”  The  chief  replied, 
“One  hundred  is  all  the  men  I  have  in  my  ‘country’.  If  we  send 
them,  who  will  ‘spell’  them?”  After  some  bickering  he  was  told 
to  supply  eighty,  but  he  could  supply  only  fifty-five.  They  were 
set  to  work  under  a  native  overseer  who  with  his  whip  worked 
them  so  fast  that  many  of  them  lost  their  strength  and  decamped. 
Then  the  headmen  of  their  villages  were  beaten  with  the  palmatorio 
and  set  to  work  with  swollen  hands  until  the  runaways  were  re¬ 
placed.  This  endless  round  of  fleeing  and  coming,  fleeing  and  com¬ 
ing,  chastising  the  headmen,  etc.,  is  almost  an  inevitable  accompani¬ 
ment  of  forcing  labor  under  the  harsh  conditions  of  the  plantation. 

Village  No.  30 

Inhabitants,  150;  tax  payers,  twenty- four.  It  has  one  worker 
sent  to  the  Coast  eight  months  ago.  At  the  outset  he  was  given  clothes 
and  his  tax  was  paid.  No  more  is  known  of  him.  Another  worked 
at  the  Post  for  six  months  receiving  food,  tax  receipt  and  13^4 
escudos.  Four  workers  were  kept  on  one  road  for  six  months  and 
two  worked  on  another  road  for  four  months.  Occasionally  a 
neighboring  planter  calls  for  laborers,  but  since  he  pays  them  well 
and  treats  them  right  there  is  no  complaint.  The  easy  conditions 
prevailing  now  in  this  region  are  due  to  the  effort  to  restore  native 
confidence  and  courage  after  the  terrible  harrowing  the  natives  were 
subjected  to  by  the  ferocious  Zink  who  was  administrador  three 
years  ago.  Under  him,  when  natives  fell  dead  at  road  work  their 
bodies  were  callously  rolled  to  one  side  and  buried  on  the  spot.  He 
started  the  practice  of  the  natives  fleeing  across  the  frontier  to  settle 
in  the  Belgian  Congo.  Zink  was  dismissed  and  spent  two  years  in 


Some  good  officials. 


Embezzling  labor. 


Forced  labor  for 
planters. 


56 


Unjust  official 
dismissed. 


Page  29 


Portugal  but  afterwards  he  obtained  a  subordinate  position  in 
Malange  where  he  has  just  died. 


57 


Village  No.  31 


Few  honest  officials. 


Trader’s  demands. 


Traders  cheat. 


58 


Chief  protects  own 
village. 


Little  trouble  with 
planters. 


Roads,  no  bridges. 


Inhabitants,  80;  tax  payers,  twenty-four.  They  tell  us  that  the 
under-secretary  came  to  this  village  last  August  to  list  the  tax  payers. 
Without  the  knowledge  of  the  administrator  he  picked  three  men 
to  work  for  a  planter  two  hundred  miles  away,  representing  that  the 
work  was  only  thirty  miles  away.  When  with  others  they  were 
being  brought  out  by  a  side-road,  they  were  caught  near  the  Post, 
taken  before  the  administrador  and  the  man-stealing  scheme  was 
exposed.  Nevertheless,  thirty-five  natives  were  sent  on  down  and 
nothing  was  done  to  the  rascally  under-secretary.  Out  here,  honest 
and  efficient  men  are  so  scarce  that  crooked  civil  servants  have  to 
be  put  up  with. 

Under  authority  from  the  Post  a  local  trader  demanded  three 
men  from  this  village.  Because  they  were  not  furnished  quickly 
enough  to  suit  him  soldiers  came  and  tied  the  headmen.  The  three 
were  sent  and  have  now  been  working  four  months.  So  far  they 
have  received  only  a  blanket  worth  40  escudos.  The  village  has 
been  called  upon  for  very  little  road  work  and  has  no  complaint 
on  this  score. 

Mr.  S —  states  that  the  traders  regularly  cheat  the  natives.  He 
personally  has  measured  hundreds  of  panos  sold  as  four  yards  and 
has  found  none  that  is  not  short  by  from  eight  to  twelve  inches. 
The  trader  treats  the  native  worse  than  he  does  his  cattle.  He  re¬ 
gards  them  as  his  animals  but  does  not  realize  that  maltreated 
natives  have  more  means  of  escaping  from  him  than  maltreated 
cattle. 

Village  No.  32 

Inhabitants,  500;  tax  payers,  one  hundred  and  fifty.  They  re¬ 
ported  five  from  this  village  working  at  the  Post.  They  received 
nothing  but  food.  Five  requisitioned  men  are  down  at  the  Coast 
working  for  planters.  One  has  returned  after  seven  months’  service, 
but  it  is  not  known  what  he  got.  Four  have  served  six  months  but 
have  not  yet  returned.  There  is  no  complaint  as  to  roadwork. 
Thanks  to  its  being  the  chief’s  village  it  comes  off  well  when  requisi¬ 
tions  for  carriers  are  made  upon  the  villages.  The  chief  sees  to  it 
that  the  other  twenty-one  villages  in  his  jurisdiction  bear  most  of 
the  burden. 

As  regards  the  “country”  (twenty-two  villages),  it  has  very 
little  trouble  with  the  work  for  planters.  The  chief  difficulty  is 
that  if  any  of  the  requisitioned  men  run  away  the  village  headmen 
are  personally  responsible  for  immediately  getting  them  back  or 
furnishing  others.  It  is  now  nearly  four  years  since  this  area  was 
so  terribly  oppressed  by  the  infamous  administrador  Zink. 

At  one  of  the  stations  we  meet  a  foreigner,  out  here  nearly 
thirty  years,  who  says  that  beyond  the  Zambesi,  500  miles  east 
of  here,  there  are  miles  upon  miles  of  splendid  roads,  ten  meters 
wide  although  there  is  no  bridge  over  the  river,  so  that  they  con¬ 
nect  with  nothing  and  no  wheel  turns  on  them.  He  knows  of  at 


Page  30 


least  forty  natives  who  died  on  that  road  building.  They  were  not 
provided  with  food,  were  worked  under  the  lash,  and  were  made 
to  toil  when  sick  with  “flu”  or  pneumonia.  Only  two  miles  from 
his  residence,  a  native  got  his  back  broken  from  a  blow  with  his 
stick  by  an  overseer  and  was  left  to  die.  A  missionary  saved  him 
but  he  was  a  cripple  for  life. 

From  certain  residents  of  long  experience  in  the  country  we 
obtained  statements  as  to  compulsory  labor  which  are  worthy  of 
close  attention. 


Statements  of  Mr.  A — 

In  all  the  villages  around  here  a  certain  number  of  hoes  are 
placed  by  the  planters.  Those  hoes  have  to  be  kept  at  work,  if  one 
workman  falls  sick  another  from  the  village  has  to  take  his  place, 
the  hoes  must  never  lie  idle.  At  L —  if  one  be  absent  from  work 
others  belonging  to  the  same  village  as  the  absentee  are  beaten.  The 
people  declare  that  they  receive  a  merely  nominal  pay,  amounting 
to  about  four  days’  work  for  one  penny,  and  have  always  to  supply 
their  own  food  or  additional  food.  Forced  unpaid  labor  is  em¬ 
ployed  on  all  the  roads  and  it  is  becoming  common  now  among  the 
natives  to  purchase  a  boy  or  girl  so  that  the  owner  can  send  the 
slave  to  do  the  road  work.  Almost  weekly  calls  are  made  on  the 
villages  for  people  for  roads,  bridges,  work  at  the  posts  and  for 
private  firms.  What  the  natives  feel  most  is  that  no  food  is  pro¬ 
vided,  and  those  remaining  in  the  villages  have  to  spend  a  great 
part  of  their  time  preparing  the  meal  and  carrying  it  to  the  work 
people,  and  nine  times  out  of  ten  the  cipaio,  a  black  put  in  charge 
of  the  gang  by  the  government,  demands  a  share  of  it.  Beating  with 
whips  by  the  cipaios  and  whites  is  very  common  and  much  resented 
by  the  natives.  During  the  past  few  weeks  there  has  come  to  my 
knowledge  a  number  of  cases  of  people  having  been  beaten  on  the 
road  and  on  a  farm.  These  people  were  beaten  because  their  food 
being  finished  they  went  home  to  get  more. 

In  some  cases  the  road  work  is  fifty  miles  from  the  village, 
especially  new  roads.  At  K —  there  are  eighteen  tax  payers,  of 
these  five  are  employed  building  a  bridge  over  the  river,  two  on 
Senr.  S — ’s  farm  and  three  at  V — .  The  three  latter  are  working 
for  the  Governor  where  they  are  provided  with  food  and  well 
treated.  This  Governor  has  the  well-being  of  the  natives  at  heart, 
and  I  know  of  a  case  where  he  sternly  reproved  a  white  man  for 
ill-treating  the  people.  Though  there  are  ten  of  the  eighteen  men 
in  this  village  thus  compelled  to  work  regularly,  cipaios  are  con¬ 
stantly  calling  to  demand  more  people.  They  cannot  let  more  go 
as  there  would  not  be  sufficient  left  in  the  village  to  provide  food 
for  those  at  work,  so  they  are  compelled  to  bribe  each  cipaio  as  he 
comes  along. 

The  cipaes  are  the  real  rulers  of  the  country.  If  one  be  sent 
out  to  seek  twenty  carriers,  he  demands  forty  or  fifty,  and  those 
among  the  people  who  have  money  can  bribe  the  cipaio  to  be  set 
free.  Their  usual  procedure  is  to  catch  all  the  women  that  they 
can  in  a  village,  and  for  each  woman  set  at  liberty  they  demand 
a  carrier  or  a  bribe. 


59 

Forced  labor. 


Little  pay. 


No  food. 


A  good  governor. 


Cipaes  are  the  real 
rulers. 


Page  31. 


Chronic 

semi-starvation. 


Increasing  mortality. 


Frequently  I  have  asked  people  to  go  with  me  to  V — ,  to  com¬ 
plain,  but  they  have  begged  me  not  to  do  so,  as  the  cipaes  in  future 
would  make  life  harder  for  them.  In  the  village  where  the  cipaio 
sleeps  for  the  night,  he  takes  whatever  woman  he  fancies  and  no 
one  dares  say  him  nay.  They  have  the  power  of  life  and  death. 
This  year  the  uncle  of  one  of  our  church  members  was  beaten  to 
death  by  one  of  them  six  miles  from  here,  and  I  suppose  there  is 
scarcely  a  village  around  us  here  that  did  not  lose  one  or  two 
people  about  three  years  ago  beaten  to  death  by  cipaios  during  the 
making  of  the  road  through  O — .  At  present  there  is  a  bridge  being 
built  over  the  river,  the  cipaio  in  charge  demanded  from  each 
village  so  many  boards,  when  the  boards  were  provided  he  said 
they  were  unsuitable  for  the  purpose,  but  he  had  boards  which 
they  must  buy  from  him  with  corn.  The  boards  brought  by  the 
natives  were  then  sent  to  V — ,  to  make  doors  and  windows  for  his 
own  house,  where  he  keeps  working  a  number  of  the  men,  provided 
for  the  building  of  the  bridge.  Though  the  crops  are  very  poor 
this  year  the  people  supplied  the  corn  demanded. 

The  number  of  cipaes  has  greatly  increased  in  recent  years 
and  also  the  number  of  calls  made  upon  the  people.  The  chronic 
state  of  semi-starvation,  in  which  the  majority  of  the  people  now 
exist,  I  attribute  to  the  excessive  demands  made  on  them  for  labor, 
leaving  insufficient  time  for  cultivation  of  their  crops.  Often  they 
are  called  away  at  planting  time  which  means  a  year  of  hunger. 
In  past  years  they  could  rely  on  rubber  and  bees  wax  to  provide 
what  was  necessary  for  taxes  and  clothing,  but  today  everything 
depends  on  their  crops.  Taxes  fall  due  about  two  months  before 
their  crops  are  ready,  and  the  people  borrow  money  from  the 
traders  to  be  repaid  in  corn.  When  the  native  is  pressed  for  his 
taxes  he  will  promise  anything  and  the  trader  sees  that  he  keeps 
his  promise.  Each  year,  during  the  early  part  of  the  dry  season, 
epidemics  of  chest  troubles  are  rife,  but  the  mortality  is  about 
three  times  as  great  today  as  it  used  to  be  years  ago.  I  judge  this 
is  due  to  mal-nutrition.  These  epidemics  mean  heavy  work  for  us, 
and  in  the  treatment  of  the  cases  I  depend  more  on  suitable  nourish¬ 
ment  than  on  medicine,  with  the  result  that  those  who  recover 
return  to  their  villages  appearing  better  than  they  did  before  they 
took  ill.  This  dry  season  the  percentage  of  fatal  cases  has  been 
higher  than  ever  before,  and  in  some  villages  the  people  were 
panic-stricken  by  the  constant  and  numerous  deaths. 

Early  this  year  there  were  many  deaths  in  the  country  from 
starvation,  and  we  fear  a  repetition  of  this  next  wet  season. 

Recently  ,the  administrador  of  A — ,  demanded,  from  the  mis¬ 
sions  and  out  stations  laborers  for  the  diamond  mines.  These  Were 
furnished  but  the  laborer  sent  from  K —  by  S,  the  elder  in  the 
school  there,  being  unwilling  to  serve,  ran  away.  For  this,  the 
elder  who  is  an  old  man,  was  made  prisoner,  sent  to  C — ,  and  there 
put  to  work.  With  the  yoke  on  his  neck,  he  is  doing  the  work 
of  an  ox,  puddling  the  clay  for  tile-making.  About  a  week  ago,  I 
sent  a  young  man  to  see  if  we  could  find  out  anything  concerning 
him,  but  he  has  not  yet  returned.  The  elder  has  no  one  to  send 
in  the  place  of  the  one  who  ran  away,  as  the  remaining  young  men 


Page  32 


are  being  compelled  to  work  for  Senr.  M — ,  a  planter. 

Last  year,  the  people  of  two  of  our  out-stations  had  their  fields 
taken  from  them  by  white  planters.  This  is  of  frequent  occurrence 
in  other  parts  of  the  country. 

During  the  past  eighteen  months  about  twenty  missionaries 
who  live  further  inland  have  left  Angola  for  British  and  Belgian 
territories.  There  must  be  weighty  reasons  for  this  as  some  whom 
I  know  personally  lived  in  Angola  for  25  years.  Needless  to  say 
many  natives  have  followed  them. 

The  administrador  who  wishes  to  give  the  natives  fair  treat¬ 
ment  soon  finds  the  traders  and  planters  against  him;  and  if  the 
official  does  not  carry  out  their  wishes  they  seem  to  be  able  to 
have  him  removed. 


Statement  Of  Mr.  B — 

Some  eighteen  months  ago,  a  native  in  charge  of  a  certain 
number  of  men  making  a  government  motor  road  10  metres  wide 
was  beaten  by  a  chefe  named  H — ,  with  a  big  stick  across  his  back, 
whilst  two  other  natives  were  told  to  hold  him.  The  cause  of  it 
was  that  not  enough  work  had  been  done  by  the  natives  under  his 
charge.  As  a  matter  of  fact  they  had  to  cut  through  huge  hard 
anthills  (about  fifteen  to  twenty  feet  high)  and  were  not  provided 
with  tools  by  the  government.  With  their  own  little  tools  the  work 
could  not  progress  quickly. 

After  having  been  severely  beaten  he  was  left  out  in  the  bush 
without  attention  and  would  probably  have  died  had  not  a  lady 
missionary  found  him  shortly  afterwards,  he  was  then  unconscious. 
It  was  many  months  before  the  man  could  stand. 

About  the  same  time  a  native  working  also  for  the  govern¬ 
ment  ill  with  pneumonia  was  found  alone  in  a  camp  without  at¬ 
tention  or  food,  although  a  white  official  was  in  charge  of  the  work. 
He  was  carried  in  a  hammock  to  the  mission  station  and  his  needs 
attended  to  but  he  died  two  or  three  days  after  he  was  found. 

Whilst  a  motor  road  was  being  made  along  the  Congo  boundary 
some  forty-five  miles  north  of  K— ,  the  official  in  charge,  with  the 
assistance  of  a  native  cipaio  beat  one  of  the  native  workers  to  death. 
The  dead  man’s  relatives,  not  expecting  to  get  justice  if  they  re¬ 
ported  the  case,  preferred  to  leave  Angola  and  to  flee  to  the  Congo. 

Another  official  is  also  reported  to  have  killed  some  native 
work  people  whilst  building  bridges  etc.,  and  the  administrador 
evidently  had  some  knowledge  of  it,  but  refused  to  take  action  as 
the  said  official  is  reported  to  have  threatened  to  expose  the  wrong 
doings  of  the  administrador. 

At  a  certain  part  of  the  motor  road,  after  cutting  it  through 
the  bush  in  a  straight  line  it  was  found  that  rather  a  long  bridge 
would  have  to  be  made  over  a  river,  so  the  plan  was  altered  and 
the  road  was  made  to  go  round  the  head  of  the  river.  Some  seventy 
to  eighty  men  were  commandeered  for  that  purpose  and  worked 
about  two  months.  When  at  the  completion  of  the  work  they  went 
for  their  pay,  they  were  told  they  might  walk  over  the  road  but 
they  would  get  no  pay. 


Missionaries  leaving. 


Traders  and  planters 
oppose  fair  treatment. 


60 


Beaten  for  slow  work. 


Beaten  to  death. 


Surveyor’s  error, 
no  pay  for  workers. 


Page  33 


Distrust  is  cause  of 
shortage  of  labor. 


Confidence,  then  plenty 
workers. 


Reasons  for  scarcity  of 
food. 


One  reason  for  the  so-called  scarcity  of  labor  is  the  lack  of 
confidence  of  the  natives  in  the  Portuguese,  because  in  many  in¬ 
stances  their  pay  has  been  withheld  from  them,  and  so  they  are 
not  trusted  any  more. 

As  an  example  I  may  mention  that  some  years  ago,  when  the 
government  had  decided  to  move  the  Mexico  Post  to  a  higher 
site,  one  hundred  and  fifty  natives  were  sent  from  K —  to  do  the 
work.  They  worked  for  eleven  months,  and  at  the  end  of  each 
month  when  asking  for  pay  were  told  that  they  would  get  it  in 
bulk  when  the  work  was  finished.  At  the  completion  of  the  work 
they  were  told  that  they  had  eaten  their  food  and  no  pay  was  given 
to  any  of  them.  The  captain,  however,  told  them  that  he  was  going 
himself  to  their  homes  and  he  wanted  some  thirty  of  them  to 
carry  his  loads  and  that  they  would  be  paid  for  that.  To  each  of 
these  men  thus  engaged  he  gave  a  cheap  cotton  shirt  worth  about 
V — ,  as  an  advance  on  their  pay.  On  reaching  the  neighborhood 
of  Lake  Dilolo  they  found  that  instead  of  taking  them  to  the  K — 
district  where  their  homes  were,  he  proposed  going  with  them 
along  the  Congo  boundary  past  their  homes.  So  they  left  him 
in  a  body  and  went  home.  Orders  were  at  once  sent  to  have 
every  one  of  these  men  arrested,  and  each  one  was  made  to  pay 
either  an  ox  or  a  load  of  rubber.  To  several  of  these  men  I  lent 
oxen  myself  to  help  to  release  them  from  this  unjust  imprison¬ 
ment.  When  the  Captain  eventually  reached  K — ,  he  was  detained 
forty  days  there  as  he  could  not  get  carriers  to  take  him  away,  all 
the  villagers  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Post  had  deserted  and  were  in 
hiding  in  the  bush.  During  that  time  a  party  of  English  prospec¬ 
tors  in  the  employment  of  the  B —  railway  company,  all  wanting 
carriers,  arrived  on  the  scene  and  no  difficulties  were  experienced 
in  providing  all  the  carriers  required  by  them,  probably  more  than 
two  hundred.  One  batch  of  about  thirty  men  coming  through  the 
bush  at  night  to  be  engaged  by  them.  They  had  confidence  in  the 
Englishmen’s  word  and  knew  that  they  would  get  pay. 

When  some  years  later  Robert  Williams  sent  an  agent  to  the 
same  district  to  collect  labor  for  the  Katanga  mines,  large  numbers 
of  natives  presented  themselves  voluntarily,  again  trusting  the 
Englishman’s  word,  and  this  was  only  stopped  when  the  govern¬ 
ment  refused  to  renew  the  contract. 

Last  year,  especially  at  the  latter  part  of  it,  there  was  great 
scarcity  of  food  in  that  district,  and  the  new  administrator  asked 
me  privately  to  frankly  give  him  my  opinion  why  it  was  so.  I  gave 
him  two  reasons. 

First — The  construction  of  the  motor  roads  took  hundreds 
of  natives  for  months  away  from  their  homes,  which  in  some  cases 
were  twenty  to  thirty  or  even  ninety  miles  away  from  the  scene  of 
their  work.  As  they  got  no  food,  their  wives  or  other  relatives 
were  constantly  employed  either  preparing  food  or  carrying  it  to 
the  workmen,  so  that  for  all  that  time  their  own  field  work  had 
to  be  left  undone. 

Secondly— Large  numbers  of  people  were  so  displeased  with 
the  administration  of  the  former  administrator ,  that  I  knew  of 


Page  3U 


several  villages  that  had  been  deserted,  the  inhabitants  going  off 
to  the  Congo,  and  others  were  prepared  to  follow  them,  meanwhile 
using  up  the  food  in  their  fields  without  cultivating  fresh  fields. 
On  the  change  of  administrador  hoping  for  better  things  from  the 
new  man,  they  decided  to  remain  on,  and  were  of  course  short  of 
food  until  the  new  crops  arrived.  Under  ordinary  circumstances 
the  natives  in  the  district  are  cultivating  largely,  and  some  years 
have  had  many  tons  of  surplus  food,  such  as  manioc  meal,  rice, 
beans,  potatoes  etc.  With  a  little  encouragement  from  the  govern¬ 
ment  the  same  conditions  would  obtain  again. 

Statement  Of  Mr.  C — 

Our  chefe  has  been  sitting  in  the  next  village  for  a  month 
gathering  workers  with  both  hands.  There  has  been  an  orgy  of 
raising  of  people  everywhere.  Nothing  like  it  has  happened  in 
this  region  before.  The  Governor  of  Benguela  asked  for  1,500  men 
from  the  small  circumscription  of  Elepi.  The  administrador  of 
Elepi  has  seemed  little  in  favor  of  these  things  and  has  so  far  fur¬ 
nished  only  about  half.  In  Ganda  there  have  been  a  great  many 
raised — 250  for  Mossamedes,  200  for  Catombela  and  450  for 
Loanda  from  the  Posto  of  Chinjenje  within  six  weeks. 

In  the  “Journal  de  Benguela”  for  October  17  there  is  a  letter 
saying  that  from  a  region  having  8,000  enrolled  for  taxes  there 
are  1,200  away  at  work.  “Unless  something  is  done  the  region 
will  be  depopulated.” 


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*  7 

I  had  two  work  letters  from  the  chief  of  police  of  C — ,  show-  ^ork  Letters1 
ing  how  he  writes  for  a  month  (these  letters  show  that  thirty-six  showing  36  days 
worked  days  are  required  to  constitute  a  “month”  of  labor).  It  shows  to  a  month- 
what  all  sorts  of  petty  officials  can  do.  No  native  is  going  to  go 
and  complain  for  they  say  that  this  chief  of  police  is  a  bad  one. 

For  this  “month”  (36  days)  of  work  the  boy  got  the  equivalent 
of  35  cents,  i.e.  a  cent  a  day.  I  gave  the  head  of  the  village  this 
amount  for  the  two  letters.  He  said  that  they  had  to  take  up  a 
collection  to  get  the  money  to  pay  the  boys’  taxes. 


61 

An  orgy  of 
conscription. 


Page  35 


In  the  fisheries. 


Stealing  labor. 


Official  evidence. 


Reason  for  uprising. 


62 


Ways  of  stealing  labor. 


Recently  a  lot  of  men  came  back  from  Mossamedes  where 
they  had  been  for  a  year  working  in  the  fisheries.  When  they 
went  they  received  a  cloth  and  a  blanket  the  whole  of  which  could 
be  bought  for  from  $1.60  to  $1.75.  I  cannot  say  how  long  exactly 
they  were  away  but  roughly  a  year.  When  they  got  back  they 
received  eighty  escudos  each,  just  the  amount  of  their  poll  tax 
which  was  just  due.  Their  last  year’s  tax  had  to  be  paid  by  their 
wives  and  families.  One  of  them  who  could  read  a  little  said  that 
he  saw  their  work-letters  and  that  they  were  written  for  six  months. 
This  is  a  good  scheme,  to  take  them  for  six  months  after  they 
are  written  for  taxes  but  have  not  yet  paid,  work  them  thirty-five 
days  to  the  month  and  send  them  back  just  before  the  next  tax.  They 
said  that  they  were  well  fed  and  on  the  whole  well  treated,  that 
one  patron  who  caused  the  death  of  a  boy  by  drowning  was  severely 
dealt  with.  They  complained  of  the  cold  at  night.  It  appears 
that  they  had  no  sufficient  shelter  and  the  region  of  Mossamedes 
and  Tiger  Bay  is  desert  and  very  little  or  no  fire  wood,  the  ones 
who  were  at  Tiger  Bay  said  that  they  did  their  cooking  with  fish 
heads.  One  of  these  said  the  worst  hardship  was  the  rotten  atmo¬ 
sphere  in  which  they  lived.  These  complained  that  many  were 
troubled  with  sores. 

In  the  last  Benguela  Journal  there  is  an  open  letter  by  the 
Governor  of  the  district  of  Benguela,  Antonio  Eduardo  Romeiras 
de  Macedo  written  on  the  8th  of  October.  He  is  explaining  why 
a  hospital  was  not  built  in  Ganda.  “Excuse  me  for  saying  to  your 
Excellency  that  to  build  this  same  single  ward  would  cost  much 
more  than  the  60,000  escudos  authorized  even  though  one  took 
advantage  of  the  materials  in  the  condemned  building,  free  rough 
labor,  etc.”  That  gives  you  unintentional  official  evidence. 

In  the  D  iario  de  Noticias,  Lisbon  of  August  6,  1924,  there  is 
a  telegram  from  Guine  about  a  native  uprising  in  the  circunscricao 
of  Mansoa.  Natives  to  the  number  of  more  than  1,000  had  as¬ 
sembled,  armed  and  refused  to  work.  I  pondered  over  this.  Why 
did  they  refuse  to  work?  A  week  or  so  afterward  I  saw  in  the 
Benguela  paper  that  ever  since  Norton  de  Matos  refused  to  let 
laborers  go  from  here  that  the  island  of  Sao  Thome  had  been  getting 
its  labor  from  Guine.  There  now  appears  to  me  a  reason  for  the 
armed  strike. 

There  are  many  ways  in  which  the  planter  steals  labor.  They 
work  nearly  all  day  and  then  the  boss  says,  “It  is  going  to  rain,” 
and  they  knock  off  and  that  day  is  not  counted.  Men  are  fined 
for  all  sorts  of  things.  He  makes  a  month  six  weeks  long.  He 
begins  to  abuse  the  man  or  accuse  him  just  about  the  time  his  time 
is  up  and  the  man  runs  away  and  that  settles  his  account.  They 
tell  the  man  when  his  time  is  up  that  they  have  contracted  him 
for  another  term.  Some  men  lie  in  wait  for  run-away  workers 
and  blackmail  them  into  working  for  them  a  while  gratis.  Some 
men  make  the  workers  work  on  Sunday  “for  their  food.”  This  is 
so  much  graft.  Just  today  I  hear  that  a  large  number  of  people 
have  been  imprisoned,  beaten,  etc.,  because  they  complained  over 
Sunday  work.  They  are  working  in  Government  service  without 
pay- 


Page  36 


Local  whites  call  out  people  and  have  them  work  for  them  on 
pretense  of  having  government  authorization.  Some  of  them  get 
away  with  it  and  one  supposes  that  they  square  the  official.  Over¬ 
loading  carriers  is  general.  Promising  big  wages  and  not  paying 
them  is  a  regular  procedure. 


The  Cipaio —  Very  often  the  government  is  government  by 
cipaio.  They  beat  and  rob  without  limit,  for  the  most  part  the 
native  is  afraid  to  complain,  and  with  reason.  He  usually  stands 
in  with  the  interpreter  and  squares  him  so  that  the  man  who  goes 
to  make  the  complaint  probably  ends  up  in  jail.  One  Chefe  who 
asked  me  to  report  cases  of  this  sort,  imprisoned  and  was  about 
to  deport  a  man  who  went  with  a  letter  to  make  a  complaint  against 
a  grafting  cipaio.  The  interpreter  took  the  letter  and  kept  it, 
ordered  the  man  to  be  seized,  brought  him  before  the  chefe  for 
lese-patriotism  or  something  of  that  kind.  The  chefe  says  “Ask 
him  what  he  means.”  The  interpreter  says  in  Umbundu  “What 
do  you  want?”  The  man  says,  “I  brought  a  letter  and  want  to 
know  if  I  am  to  pay  the  cipaio  two  dollars.”  The  interpreter  says 
to  the  chefe  “He  says  that  he  does  not  have  to  answer  your  questions, 
he  belongs  to  the  American  mission,  where  he  has  two  children. 
(The  man’s  great  grief  was  that  he  was  childless).”  The  great 
fact  in  this  country  is  that  the  native  has  no  place  where  he  can 
lodge  a  complaint.  Some  men  think  that  the  way  to  get  good 
service  is  to  back  their  cipaes.  To  treat  a  cipaio  with  disrespect 
is  treason.  Some  cipaes  have  been  known  to  make  300  escudos  a 
day  in  blackmail.  They  go  and  pretend  to  be  gathering  laborers 
and  let  them  off1  for  20  escudos  a  head.  One  fellow  would  eat 
nothing  but  goat  livers.  Requiring  women  is  a  routine.  More 
labor  is  required  for  Angola  than  formerly.  The  time  to  which 
people  are  subject  is  shorter.  The  old  contract  system  was  slavery 
in  every  sense  of  the  word  but  only  slaves  and  some  unfortunate 
half-wits  and  incorrigibles  were  subject  to  it.  Under  the  present 
method  any  one  is  liable.  There  are  plenty  of  instances  of  skilled 
workmen,  men  in  regular  employment,  etc.,  being  taken.  There 
is  less  cloth  in  evidence,  more  wearing  of  skins  and  bark.  The 
price  of  cloth  has  increased  out  of  all  proportion  to  the  wages  and 
even  out  of  proportion  to  the  price  of  products  of  the  country. 
Where  formerly  a  tin  of  corn  would  buy  two  yards  of  cloth  it  buys 
scarcely  a  yard.  Where  formerly  a  day’s  rough  work  got  a  yard 
of  cotton  cloth  it  now  takes  from  three  days  to  a  week.  The 
tendency  of  forced  labor  is  to  get  rid  of  free  employment.  There 
are  many  instances  of  this.  Very  often  the  officials  and  the  traders 
stand  together. 

I  find  no  instance  of  road  work  being  paid  for.  Villages 
furnish  from  two  to  fifteen  people  all  the  time.  Other  villages 
only  furnish  on  occasion  and  they  turn  out  men,  women  and 
children.  I  find  that  about  half  of  the  people  who  pay  taxes  are 
away  in  a  year.  In  one  village  of  eighteen  tax  payers  ten  had  been 
away  practically  all  the  year  to  the  plantations.  In  another  village 
of  twenty  tax  payers,  ten  had  been  away  to  the  plantations  and  they 
had  furnished  two  more  for  work  on  the  road  for  about  six  months. 
The  large  village  of  C — ,  probably  about  100  tax  payers,  they 


63 


Government  by  cipaio. 


Worse  than  slavery. 


64 


Half  of  the  people 
away  on  forced  labor. 


Page  37 


Cipaes  a  curse. 


Hostages. 


Traders  cheat. 


Traders  become 


could  not  give  me  the  numbers,  had  furnished  carriers  as  follows 
during  the  current  year:  to  Loanda,  six;  Nganda,  ten;  to  place 
unknown,  ten;  Mossamedes,  twenty-eight;  Cuma,  five;  Road,  ten, 
for  about  six  weeks,  no  pay;  recent  levy,  unknown  destinations,  six; 
Government  work,  received  no  pay.  The  men  from  Loanda  only 
are  back.  It  is  said  that  they  were  well  paid  and  well  treated. 
If  I  am  not  mistaken  this  makes  sixty  away,  seventy-five  that  have 
seen  considerable  service.  They  say  that  there  are  no  men  left 
in  the  village  except  old  men.  Several  of  these  were  taken  from 
service  of  white  men  and  they  did  not  receive  the  balance  of  the 
wages  due  them  on  their  free  labor.  This  village  has  everywhere 
a  reputation  for  the  vigorous  way  in  which  they  have  been  push¬ 
ing  their  own  cultivation.  No  one  has  been  so  prejudiced  as  to  say 
that  they  were  lazy. 


Statement  of  a  European  Resident 

One  of  the  curses  of  the  country  is  the  cipaes ,  virtually  legal¬ 
ized  brigands,  let  loose  upon  the  people.  Ninety-nine  times  out  of 
a  hundred  the  Portuguese  official  stands  by  the  cipaio  and  any  com¬ 
plainant  gets  beaten.  The  cipaes  asks  a  village  for  double  the  num¬ 
ber  of  soldiers  he  has  been  sent  out  to  get.  Then  he  lets  off  the  half 
who  bribe  him  the  more  heavily.  The  authorities  admit  that  these 
fellows  are  rascals  and  that  they  blackmail  the  villages  to  the  limit. 

On  a  recent  ten  days’  journey  toward  the  rail  head  he  met  a 
great  many  carriers  carrying  loads  and  was  struck  with  their  poor 
physical  condition.  Many  of  them  were  old  men  unfit  to  carry 
burdens.  He  found  a  man  lying  unburied  by  the  road  and  another 
who  was  said  to  have  been  beaten  to  death  by  the  cipaes  because  he 
could  not  get  on  with  his  load. 

The  cipaes  are  very  free  in  raping  the  young  girls. 

Another  bad  system  is  that  of  hostages.  They  punish  a  man 
for  the  misdeeds  of  his  kinsmen.  If  they  cannot  catch  a  thief,  the 
officials  punish  his  nearest  relative.  So  they  make  the  headman 
responsible  for  everything  that  happens  that  they  can’t  get  directly 
at. 

To  get  men  as  soldiers  and  prevent  them  escaping  by  running 
away,  they  tie  up  all  the  women  in  the  village,  so  that  the  men  give 
themselves  up  in  order  to  get  the  women  released. 

The  trader  gets  the  native  into  debt  by  persuading  him  to  take 
something  he  can’t  pay  for  at  the  time.  They  require  him  to  work 
it  off  which  means  he  will  work  enough  to  pay  for  it  three  or  four 
times  over.  Often  he  doesn’t  even  know  the  value  in  escudos  of 
what  he  has  taken.  Later,  the  trader  can  name  any  sum  he  pleases 
as  its  value.  Thus  the  man  is  kept  working  for  the  trader  as  long 
as  the  latter  has  any  shadow  of  justification  in  case  the  matter 
were  inquired  into  from  the  Post. 

chefes.  The  chefes  are  recruited  from  the  traders  and  many  are  men  of 

bad  character. 


Page  38 


State  of  Mr.  E — ,  a  Railway  Executive 

No  white  man  from  Portugal  ever  comes  here  with  the  inten¬ 
tion  of  doing  a  day  of  manual  labor.  It  never  enters  into  the  head 
of  any  Portuguese  out  here  to  gain  his  living  by  work.  He  always 
expects  to  live  by  a  government  job,  by  trade,  or  by  making  the 
native  work  for  his  benefit.  The  Benguela  railroad  is  so  loaded 
down  by  appointees  forced  upon  it  by  the  authorities  that  it  cannot 
make  any  money  for  its  English  shareholders.  It  has  twice  or  thrice 
the  traffic  it  had  in  1914,  yet  its  net  income  is  no  greater. 

By  its  contract  with  the  authorities  for  its  native  workers  the  Wages  embezzled, 
railroad  pays  the  men  directly,  in  addition  to  food  and  a  blanket, 
one-fifth  of  the  agreed-on  wages  and  at  the  end  of  the  period  of 
service  (either  three  or  six  months,  but  usually  three)  the  remain¬ 
ing  four-fifths  of  the  wages  is  sent  to  the  chefe  of  the  Post  where 
the  men  were  recruited,  to  be  paid  to  them  on  their  return.  I  have 
never  yet  heard  of  any  of  this  money  being  paid  to  the  native  who 
earned  it.  I  do  not  know  what  becomes  of  it. 

Statement  of  Mr.  F —  of  a  Large  Contracting  Firm  Engaged  on 

Harbor  Works  at  Lobito  Bay 

This  firm  has  at  work  a  thousand  natives  who  have  been  ob¬ 
tained  from  the  Government.  It  gives  them  a  blanket,  a  loin  cloth 
and  a  jersey  and  they  serve  for  six  months.  At  the  end  of  the  term 
the  firm  gives  them  one-fifth  of  their  wages  and  pays  the  remaining 
four-fifths  to  the  Government,  which  remits  it  to  the  chefes  de  posto 
where  the  men  were  recruited.  We  know  that  the  money  is  actually 
transmitted  to  the  chefes,  for  we  see  their  signatures;  but  we  don’t 
know  what  becomes  of  it  then. 


Page  39 


PART  II 


Women  workers. 


Government 

requirements. 


Taken  far  from 


PORTUGUESE  EAST  AFRICA 

During  its  sojourn  of  twenty-four  days  in  Portuguese  East 
Africa,  the  Commission  secured  data  in  Lourengo  Marques,  while 
Professor  Ross  made  a  journey  of  about  eight  hundred  miles, 
chiefly  by  motor  car,  from  Lourengo  Marques  to  Inhambane  and 
return,  visited  Beira,  and  journeyed  by  rail  and  motor  car  from 
Beira  to  Umtali  in  Rhodesia  and  return.  In  the  following,  conscious 
effort  is  made  not  to  disclose  the  identity  of  the  person  supplying 
the  information. 

65  Mine  Laborers  at  Johannesburg. — Before  leaving  the  Rand 
we  conferred  for  three  hours  through  an  interpreter  who  possessed 
their  confidence  with  thirty-one  native  mine  workers  from  Portu¬ 
guese  East  Africa,  most  of  whom  had  served  three  or  more  terms 
in  the  mines.  They  were  largely  from  the  Manjacaze  district. 
They  are  troubled  because  their  women,  even  pregnant  or  with 
a  nursling,  are  taken  for  road  work  by  the  Cipaes.  In  out-of-the- 
way  places  the  Government  builds  little  barraces  to  house  them. 
No  pay  nor  food.  According  to  the  circumscription  the  term  of 
service  is  from  one  week  to  five  but  a  woman  may  be  called  out 
again  in  the  same  year.  Others  in  the  village  bring  food  to  them, 
in  some  cases  a  day’s  journey  away.  Girls  as  young  as  fifteen  are 
taken  and  some  are  made  to  submit  sexually  to  those  in  charge. 
They  work  under  a  black  foreman  who  uses  a  stick.  They  begin 
work  at  six,  stop  an  hour  at  noon,  and  work  till  sunset.  There  are 
some  miscarriages  from  heavy  work. 

66  Labor  on  Government  requisition  ( shibaru )  varies  with  the 
circumscription.  In  some  places  every  man  they  get  hold  of  must 
work  six  months.  For  this  service  they  get  two  and  one-half  pounds 
Portuguese  which  is  paid  by  the  Government  at  the  posto  and  not 
by  the  employer.  They  do  not  know  what  the  employer  pays  the 
Government.  If  they  work  at  the  posto  their  stint  is  two  months 
and  they  get  nothing.  Work  on  Government  docks,  etc.,  is  done 
under  contractors,  so  the  men  get  their  two  pounds  ten  each. 

One  man  had  to  work  seven  months  to  get  six  months’  credit. 
The  master  of  another  would  refuse  to  “write”  a  day  whenever  he 
was  cross  with  that  worker,  so  he  had  to  work  about  two  weeks 
home,  extra.  Sometimes  they  live  one  hundred  and  fifty  miles  from  their 
home,  must  walk  both  ways,  carrying  their  own  food.  In  one 
case  they  had  to  go  from  Inhambane  to  Louren^o  Marques,  four 
hundred  miles.  At  the  completion  of  one  year  they  were  faced 
with  the  prospect  of  walking  this  distance  back.  Six  joined  in 
a  protest  and  for  this  they  were  taken  again  and  sent  up  to 
Mozambique  to  serve  as  policemen,  have  been  there  now  nine 
months.  For  their  service  they  received  no  clothes  nor  blanket, 
only  their  two  and  one-half  pounds.  They  get  rations  if  they  work 
in  Lourengo  Marques  for  the  Government  but  on  the  plantations 
they  have  to  provide  their  own  food  or  buy  it.  If  they  buy  it, 


Page  UO 


there  will  be  no  money  coming  to  them.  A  sugar  factory  will 
provide  mealies,  meat  and  salt.  They  get  no  tax  receipts  for  their 
six  months’  work.  To  pay  their  hut  tax  takes  one  and  one-half 
of  their  two  and  one-half  pounds.  If  they  possess  two  huts,  they 
must  work  extra  to  get  the.  tax  money.  If  they  work  for  nothing  for 
the  government  they  must  pay  the  hut  tax  besides. 

After  six  months  of  service  one  may  have  three  or  four 
months  at  home  but  may  then  be  taken  again  unless  he  hides  out 
in  the  jungle  and  has  his  wife  bring  him  food.  Of  those  present 
five  have  been  required  to  render  forced  labor,  the  others  have 
missed  it  by  being  on  the  Rand.  Three  out  of  the  five  have  been 
beaten  by  foremen.  All  but  six  out  of  thirty-one  have  seen 
laborers  beaten.  Thirteen  out  of  thirty-one  have  seen  women  at 
forced  labor  beaten.  Three  have  had  a  female  relative  abused 
sexually  by  the  white  man;  one  a  sister-in-law,  one  an  aunt,  one 
a  betrothed.  Five  others  know  of  women  so  treated  in  their  village. 
Some  here  have  altogether  missed  forced  labor  by  hiding  out,  by 
being  in  constant  employment,  or  by  being  in  school.  Their  main 
protection  has  been  work  on  the  Rand. 

A  Sugar  Estate 

A  compound  manager  of  a  big  English  sugar  estate  told  us 
that  four  thousand  natives,  three  thousand  on  contract,  there  get  a 
pound  a  month.  Four-fifths  is  kept  back  to  be  paid  at  their  home 
station  but  he  goes  and  pays  it  to  them  himself  in  the  presence  of 
the  administrador .  Otherwise  they  wouldn’t  get  it.  He  under¬ 
stands  that  on  the  sugar  estates  along  the  Zambesi  there  is  virtual 
slavery  for  they  get  only  five  shillings  Portuguese  (less  than  a 
dollar)  a  month. 

A  few  years  ago  the  men  were  getting  six  escudos  a  month  and 
as  the  money  depreciated  they  were  not  earning  more  than  twelve 
shillings  a  month.  Hence  there  was  a  lot  of  desertion.  A  hundred 
boys  would  be  delivered  to  him  but  in  a  few  days  half  would  have 
slipped  away,  lying  out  in  the  bush  or  else  gone  over  to  the  Rand. 
The  manager  got  the  London  directors  to  raise  wages  to  a  pound 
a  month,  Portuguese.  The  industries  here  all  have  to  respond  to 
the  influence  of  the  pay  and  treatment  on  the  Rand. 

Missionary  Station  1 

At  a  mission  more  than  two  hundred  and  fifty  miles  from 
Lourengo  Marques  the  missionaries  tell  us  that  in  their  district 
the  highway  work  required  of  women  is  fifteen  days  a  year.  How¬ 
ever,  some  of  the  women  on  the  roads  are  working  out  the  hut  tax 
of  their  husbands.  The  standard  term  of  compulsory  labor 
(shibaru)  is  six  months  of  thirty  working  days  each,  which  will 
require  eight  or  nine  months  to  perform,  for  the  laborers  lose 
Sundays,  rainy  days  and  days  when  they  have  worked  in  the 
forenoon  but  it  rains  in  the  afternoon.  Men  sent  far  from  home 
get  five  pounds  Portuguese  ($18.75)  for  their  shibaru.  Those  serv¬ 
ing  nearer  get  from  twelve  to  fifteen  shillings  Portuguese  ($2.25 
to  $3.00)  a  month  according  to  their  work.  The  employer  pays 


Hut  tax. 


Flee  to  the  Rand. 


67 


Contract  payments. 


Influence  of  the  Rand. 


68 


Compulsory  labor — 
eight  or  nine  months. 


Page  J^l 


Work  on  the  Rand  no 
exemption. 


69 

Hut  taxes. 


Court  of  appeal. 


70 


Office  holding  for  gain. 


71 


Colonial  service. 


only  at  the  end  of  the  term  and  in  the  presence  of  the  administrador. 
A  native  employed  by  a  white  man  on  a  six  months’  contract 
witnessed  before  the  official  is  exempt  from  shibaru,  but  this  does 
not  hold  for  the  75,000  blacks  from  this  colony  working  on  the 
Rand.  This  year  every  one  over  fifteen  years  of  age  has  to  pay  his 
hut  tax  up  there.  There  is  in  fact  no  way  by  which  a  Rand  mine 
worker  from  here  can  terminate  his  responsibilities  to  the  Portu¬ 
guese  Government. 

If  there  is  a  hut  a  tax  must  be  paid  on  it  even  if  the  occupant 
is  a  widow.  If  a  hut  is  burned  down,  it  has  to  be  “killed”  on  the 
books  of  the  administrador  or  the  tax  for  it  will  be  exacted  year 
after  year.  The  Secretary  of  Administration  who  goes  about  list¬ 
ing  the  huts  gets  a  percentage  of  the  tax  receipts,  so  it  is  to  his 
interest  to  decide  every  doubtful  question  in  favor  of  the  Govern¬ 
ment. 

Each  administrador  is  a  law  to  himself.  Some  are  quite  con¬ 
siderate  of  the  natives,  while  others  are  very  unsympathetic.  The 
Intendencia  (native  affairs’  office)  is  a  court  of  appeal  open  to 
natives  for  complaints  of  any  kind.  Without  cost  to  themselves 
they  may  complain  against  the  administrador  or  even  the  Gover¬ 
nor.  Their  practical  value  to  the  natives  varies  greatly. 

Under  the  monarchy  (up  to  1910)  there  was  greater  perman¬ 
ency  of  tenure  than  there  is  today.  Some  officials  learned  the  native 
tongue  and  became  very  efficient.  Now  the  tenure  is  shorter  and 
the  officials  are  much  shifted  about.  The  colonial  service  is  far 
less  a  career  than  formerly  and  the  official  is  much  keener  to  make 
money  quickly.  This  latter  observation  is  emphatically  confirmed 
by  a  thoughtful  merchant  in  one  of  the  towns.  In  his  judgment 
none  of  the  Portuguese  office  holders  comes  out  with  any  other 
thought  than  gain.  Neither  officials  nor  traders  create  anything; 
they  only  squeeze.  He  has  shown  them  ways  in  which  the  natives 
might  be  encouraged  to  till  the  rich  soil  of  the  bottom  lands  of 
the  Limpopo,  but  they  only  shrug  their  shoulders.  Why  should 
they  look  ahead  and  plan  to  promote  the  economic  upbuilding  of 
the  country?  They  do  not  care  for  the  country,  they  never  expect  to 
settle  there.  They  care  not  even  for  the  future  of  the  Government 
which  they  represent.  Their  controlling  thought  is  to  make  money 
before  another  is  given  their  place.  They  realize  it  is  theirs  to 
“make  hay  while  the  sun  shines.”  So  they  take  no  trouble  for 
the  future  of  the  country,  or  of  the  Government,  or  of  the  natives 
but  persist  in  their  policy  of  wringing  money  out  of  the  natives. 
The  administrador s  never  explain  anything  to  the  natives,  justify 
their  treatment  of  them,  tell  them  why  forced  labor  is  necessary, 
or  hold  out  to  them  a  promising  future.  They  never  learn  to 
speak  or  even  to  understand  the  native  language. 

» 

A  Roman  Catholic  Ex-missionary 

A  former  missionary,  a  Portuguese,  met  near  Inhambane 
hundreds  of  miles  to  the  north,  confirms  this  judgment.  He 
says  that  the  officials  sent  out  are  here  for  money  and  take  little 
interest  in  the  permanent  welfare  of  the  natives  or  of  the  colony. 


Page  U2 


Colonial  administration  is  less  a  career  than  formerly.  Staying 
now  a  shorter  time  than  under  the  monarchy,  the  functionaries  are 
more  in  a  hurry  to  make  money  and  identify  themselves  less  with 
the  colony.  Moreover,  the  basis  of  selection  of  men  sent  out  as 
officials  is  not  personal  merit  but  politics.  The  places  are  “plums” 
to  reward  past  or  future  services  to  the  party.  Hence  the  ruling 
purpose  of  the  official  is  not  to  do  his  utmost  for  the  colony  and 
for  Portugal  but  to  stow  away  the  greatest  profit  during  his  brief 
incumbency. 

A  Native  Preacher  72 

A  native  preacher  reports  that  in  his  district  the  blacks  fear  Fear>  and  mistrust. 
shibaru  because  they  know  not  where  they  are  to  be  sent  to  work, 
nor  for  how  long.  A  number  of  them  were  required  to  work  in 
a  deep  railway  cut  near  Louren^o  Marques  and  were  killed  by 
a  cave-in.  Not  knowing  what  dangers  they  will  be  sent  into,  many 
desert  their  huts  and  lie  out  in  the  bush,  while  members  of  their 
family  bring  them  food. 


A  Portuguese  Lawyer 


A  Portuguese  lawyer  of  an  old  aristocratic  family  criticises 
severely  the  labor  system  for  giving  no  credit  for  work  done  on 
one’s  own  plot. 


No  credit  for 
work  on  own  plot. 


A  Group  Of  Native  Laborers 


73 


From  eight  natives  questioned  it  appears  that  those  just  back  No  rest, 
from  Johannesburg  are  allowed  to  “sit”  a  week  before  being  taken 
for  shibaru.  The  police  do  not  disturb  a  native  employed  by  a 
white  man,  but  he  may  be  caught  and  sent  off  for  compulsory 
service  the  day  after  his  employment  ceases.  One  who  has  served 
his  four  months’  term  may  breathe  easily  for  only  a  week  or  two. 

After  that  the  police  will  take  him  off  if  there  is  a  call  for 
laborers.  Hence,  many  who  have  performed  shibaru  hide  in  the 
bush  until  they  are  tired  of  that  life  and  willing  to  return  to  their 
hut  and  take  their  chances. 

As  soon  as  a  report  circulates  that  a  hundred  men  are  to  be 
seized  for  shibaru  in  a  certain  district,  there  is  a  rush  to  the 
recruiting  office  of  the  W.  N.  L.  A.  (Witwatersrand  Native  Labor  influence  of  W.  N.  L.  A. 
Association)  for  after  a  native  has  signed  with  them  the  police 
dare  not  touch  him.  The  Association  will  spend  any  amount  of 
money  to  prevent  their  recruits  being  taken  by  the  police,  for  this 
would  lower  their  prestige  in  the  eyes  of  the  natives. 


Village  A. — 

Eight  men  are  present,  very  bright  looking.  The  superiority 
of  these  East  Coast  people  over  those  of  Angola  is  very  pro¬ 
nounced.  Regularity  of  features,  shapely  heads  and  bright  faces 
are  quite  common.  The  labor  experts  at  Johannesburg  pronounce 
the  East  Coast  people  to  be  the  most  valuable  native  element  on 
the  Rand,  distinctly  superior  to  the  Zulus  and  Basutos.  It  is 
supposed  that  the  fine  quality  of  these  natives  is  attributable  to 
Asiatic  blood  (Arab  or  Phoenician)  introduced  in  the  remote  past. 


74 


Superiority  of  East 
coast  people. 


Page  t+3 


Escape  to  the  Rand. 


75 


Women  earn  taxes. 


Method  of  collecting 
taxes. 


76 


No  men  left. 


77 


Paid. 


Paid  not  enough. 


Of  the  fifty  odd  hut  tax  payers  in  this  village  twenty-two  are 
on  the  Rand  and  most  of  the  others  are  employed  by  white  men. 
Hence,  none  have  been  called  upon  this  year  for  shibaru.  Four  of 
them  have  rendered  such  service  for  1,  2,  3  and  3  months  respec¬ 
tively.  Since  there  are  no  industries  in  this  district  they  were  em¬ 
ployed  about  the  administrador's  premises.  The  one  who  served 
two  months  was  paid  nine  shillings,  but  none  of  the  others  received 
anything.  Only  the  one-month  man  was  given  any  food;  the  others 
had  to  have  food  sent  from  home.  It  is  only  when  they  are  con¬ 
tracted  for  by  a  private  employer  that  they  get  rations,  and  these 
are  poor  and  short.  The  fear  of  shibaru  is  a  great  inducement 
to  enlist  for  mine  work  on  the  Rand  where  one  is  sure  of  good 
food  and  good  pay.  When  the  police  catch  a  man  they  tie  him 
up.  If  the  man  is  dilatory  or  tries  to  hide,  he  is  likely  to  be 
brutally  beaten  by  the  police. 

The  women  have  to  work  unpaid  for  at  least  fifteen  days;  and 
each  must  bring  another  woman  in  her  place.  If  her  hut  tax  is 
unpaid  a  woman  must  work  on  the  highway,  or  other  public  work, 
even  if  she  is  a  new  widow.  She  may  even  be  sent  to  work  for  a 
planter.  She  works  till  the  time  comes  to  pay  her  next  hut  tax. 
Then  they  consider  her  last  year’s  tax  paid  and  release  her  to  give 
her  a  chance  to  find  the  money  for  the  new  hut  tax.  If  she  can’t 
find  it  she  becomes  a  state  serf  for  another  year.  There  is  no 
rate  of  commutation  between  hut  tax  and  day’s  work. 

You  can  not  pay  your  hut  tax  until  the  policeman  comes  and 
notifies  you  it  is  due.  But  you  cannot  pay  the  policeman  nor  can 
you  go  straight  to  headquarters;  you  must  traipse  around  with  him 
while  he  makes  his  rounds,  lasting  one,  two  or  three  days,  as  if  you 
were  in  custody  and  end  up  with  him  at  the  office  of  the  Secretary 
where  you  pay  the  tax.  The  system  is  contemptuous  of  human 
dignity. 

Village  B. — 

Forty  huts,  thirty-nine  men,  twenty-nine  working  on  the  Rand, 
four  working  as  volunteers,  while  only  this  morning  six  have  been 
seized  for  shibaru.  So  now  in  this  roomy,  pretty  Christian  village 
not  a  man  is  visible  and  there  is  no  one  to  question  but  the  women. 
They  have  no  highway  work,  for  in  this  sandy  country  no  road¬ 
building  has  been  attempted.  They  say  that  a  widow  unable  to 
raise  the  money  for  her  hut  tax  will  have  to  remain  in  prison 
until  some  one  pays  it  for  her  even  one  or  two  years. 

Mission  Laborers 

Interviews  with  these  gave  the  following  results: 

Case  1. — Has  had  five  shiharus,  three  in  one  year.  For  example,  some 
years  ago  he  spent  two  thirty-day  months  laying  sleepers,  for  which  he  got 
ten  shillings  a  month  and  plenty  of  food. 

Case  2. — Served  three  months  on  a  rum  estate  three  or  four  years  ago. 
Owing  to  the  fluctuations  of  the  escudo  it  is  impossible  for  us  to  figure  the 
value  of  his  pay.  He  was  worked  hard  and  his  rations  were  so  scanty  that 
he  had  to  have  food  sent  from  his  home  twenty-five  miles  away. 

Case  3. — Was  “sold”  to  a  man  in  Inhambane  who  put  him  with  masons. 
After  three  weeks  they  gave  him  six  shillings  and  let  him  go.  He  got  no  food 


Page  4-4 


but  was  given  twopence  a  day  to  buy  his  food  with.  In  his  own  words  “How 
can  a  man  get  a  bellyfull  on  twopence?”  The  same  year  he  worked  a  week 
in  the  administrador’s  garden.  No  pay,  no  food. 

Case  U- — Worked  two  thirty-day  months  contracted  to  a  black  farmer 
about  forty  miles  away  making  cane  beer,  got  ten  shillings  per  month.  Food 
eked  out  from  home. 

Case  5. — Worked  a  year  helping  the  police  catch  men;  ten  shillings  a 
month  and  insufficient  food. 

Case  6. — In  1922  worked  six  thirty-day  tickets  on  a  sugar  estate  where 
he  was  driven  very  hard.  Although  there  was  plenty  of  food  they  became  very 
thin.  If  they  got  sick  they  were  not  allowed  to  come  home,  they  died  right 
there.  He  was  paid  three  pounds  but  the  hut  tax  took  half  his  wages.  The  hut  ^  hulTtax  W°r^ 
tax  had  to  be  paid  in  British  sterling,  but  the  wages  were  always  paid  in 
Portuguese.  At  one  time  it  took  a  man’s  wages  for  six  months  to  pay  his  hut 
tax.  Then  the  Indian  traders  would  hoard  gold  and  when  tax-paying  time 
came  sell  it  for  Portuguese  money  at  from  twenty-five  per  cent,  to  fifty  per 
cent,  advance,  sometimes  even  two-to-one.  Last  year  for  the  first  time  the 
hut  tax  could  be  paid  in  Portuguese. 

Case  7. — Worked  a  thirty-day  month  on  a  rum  estate  where  he  got  mush 
and  ten  shillings.  As  soon  as  he  got  home  he  enlisted  for  the  Rand. 

Case  8. — Served  three  thirty-day  months  on  a  distant  rum  estate,  getting 
nine  shillings  a  month. 

Case  9. — In  1922  worked  for  twelve  months  in  Lourengo  Marques,  for 
which  he  got  food  and  six  pounds.  Stayed  at  home  three  months  and  then, 
fearing  to  be  caught  again,  obtained  work  at  the  mission.  The  Portuguese 
farmers  about  here  try  to  get  volunteer  labor  but  they  so  maltreat  labor  that 
they  can  get  it  only  on  requisition. 

Case  10. — Seven  years  ago  worked  three  months  sawing  timber  for  the 
railway ;  got  nothing,  not  even  food.  Since  then  he  has  been  working  on  the 
Rand  most  of  the  time. 

Case  11. — Some  years  ago  worked  three  months  on  a  sugar  estate,  getting 
ten  shillings  a  month. 

I  asked  how  long  they  feel  safe  against  another  shibaru.  They  No  security, 
reply  unless  you  are  clever  and  hide  out  you  are  liable  to  be  taken 
again  within  a  week.  So  they  sleep  unprotected  in  the  bush  with 
only  a  blanket.  They  complain  that  each  year  the  hut  tax  is  in¬ 
creased  and  that  their  pay  is  so  small  that  after  paying  the  hut  tax 
they  have  little  left  for  buying  necessaries.  They  say  they  wouldn’t 
mind  working  for  nothing  three  months  in  a  year  provided  they 
were  treated  decently  and  could  then  feel  themselves  secure  for 
the  rest  of  the  twelve  months. 

Theological  Students  78 

Tapping  the  experience  of  seven  young  native  pastor-teachers 
studying  theology,  it  came  out  that  one  of  them  some  time  ago 
served  three  months  on  a  rum  estate  where  he  was  worked  hard, 
got  no  pay  and  little  food.  On  his  return  he  enlisted  for  work 
on  the  Rand.  Returning  with  eleven  pounds  saved  he  reached 
home  with  only  three.  The  others  having  been  steadily  in  school 
or  employed  about  the  mission  had  not  been  molested. 

They  say  no  law  restricts  shibaru  to  once  a  year.  Why 
doesn’t  the  administrador  keep  books,  or  give  out  passes,  so  that 
a  man  who  already  has  worked  the  term  will  feel  safe  for  the  rest 
of  that  year?  One  native  said  “Wives  in  an  advanced  state  of 


Page  U5 


pregnancy  or  with  new-born  children  are  caught  and  put  to  heavy 
Women  suffer.  carrier  work.  I  have  seen  a  woman  with  a  young  child  bound  to 

her  back  and  balancing  a  heavy  load  on  her  head,  lose  her  child 
by  drowning  when,  in  crossing  a  river,  the  water  grew  deeper  than 
expected  and  the  woman  was  not  free  to  use  her  arms  to  save  her 
child.” 

Exactions  at  the  Border.  Another  complaint  is  that  at  the  border  those  coming  from 

Johannesburg  are  robbed  of  their  savings  by  being  made  to  pay 
an  exhorbitant  duty  on  everything  they  bring  with  them.  When 
a  man  brings  in  a  little  cloth  they  demand,  “Why  did  you  buy 
your  cloth  of  the  English?  Why  didn’t  you  wait  and  buy  it  here? 
With  this  duty  we’ll  make  you  buy  it  a  second  time!” 

The  native  is  discouraged  in  trying  to  improve  his  stock  be¬ 
cause  if  he  rears  a  fine  specimen  of  chicken  the  administrator  or 
Demands  of  officials.  official  will  see  it  and  say,  “Here,  I  want  that  chicken,”  take  it 

and  allow  the  owner  the  price  of  a  scrawny  Portuguese  fowl,  say 
sixpence.  I  have  heard  of  an  official  who  took  a  fancy  to  a  donkey 
much  finer  than  his  own.  He  seized  it  and  allowed  the  owner 
the  value  of  an  ordinary  donkey. 


79  Mission  No.  2 

A  missionary  of  long  residence,  well  acquainted  with  the  native 
languages,  who  has  been  in  every  part  of  the  province,  recounts 
many  cases  of  the  conscienceless  behavior  of  the  authorities. 

Robbed  of  cattle.  A  few  years  ago  the  government  allowed  a  gang  of  Portuguese 

to  go  about  the  country  pretending  that  the  cattle  were  sick  and 
must  be  exterminated.  They  didn’t  molest  the  mission  herds,  only 
the  natives’  cattle.  They  offered  a  few  shillings  a  head  and  if  this 
offer  were  rejected  they  would  shoot  the  cattle  in  the  kraal;  so 
naturally  the  natives  took  what  was  offered.  The  cattle  were  driven 
together,  shipped  and  taken  up  to  Johannesburg  to  be  butchered. 
The  thing  was  a  big  robber  game  put  through  with  the  connivance 
of  the  government  officials. 

indifference  to  famine.  He  told  of  the  indifference  of  the  Portuguese  authorities  when 

there  was  a  famine  here  ten  years  ago.  The  governor  went  over 
the  province  and  reported  to  the  Lourenco  Marques  Guardian  that 
there  was  very  little  suffering  and  no  deaths  by  starvation.  The 
missionary  who  had  been  all  over  the  province,  gave  the  grim  facts 
to  the  editor  and  their  publication  raised  a  great  storm.  The 
Portuguese  authorities  tried  every  means  to  make  the  editor  divulge 
the  source  of  his  information.  Realizing  that  they  were  expected 
to  do  something,  the  Portuguese  sent  to  Brazil  for  a  shipload  of 
corn.  It  arrived  three  days  overdue  on  account  of  bad  weather 
and  the  authorities  refused  to  accept  delivery.  The  matter  was 
fought  out  in  the  courts  and  eventually  the  ship’s  delay  was  found 
to  be  justified.  In  the  meantime  the  corn  unloaded  on  the  docks 
had  all  rotted  while  the  natives  continued  to  perish  of  hunger. 


80  A  Native  Pastor 

A  Christian  pastor  says  that  the  full  term  of  work  on  the 
sugar  plantations  is  four  thirty-day  months,  but  at  such  a  distance 


Page  46 


Terms  of  forced  labor. 


as  Lourenqo  Marques,  six  months.  After  one  has  been  let  rest  a 
month,  one  will  be  taken  again  if  they  can  catch  him;  so  quite 
often  the  men  serve  two  or  more  shibarus  in  a  year.  Men  caught 
hiding  are  sent  to  Mozambique  as  police  for  three  years.  Some¬ 
times  when  the  police  observe  a  man  run  away  they  beat  his  wife. 

Ordinarily  for  a  thirty-day  month  one  gets  twelve  and  one-half 
escudos  (30  cents).  It  may  be  that  the  employer  pays  the  govern¬ 
ment  the  man’s  hut  tax  besides. 

A  Mission  Workman 

In  1923  this  man  for  four  thirty-day  months  carried  planks 
and  stones  for  white  artisans  who  were  building  a  house.  The  work 
was  heavy  but  the  day  was  that  of  the  whites,  viz.  eight  hours.  He 
got  fifty  escudos  (then  $1.50)  for  the  whole  time  and  the  employer 
did  not  pay  his  hut  tax.  Three  others  with  him  got  the  same  pay. 

He  raised  his  hut  tax  by  working  for  the  mission  at  75  cents  a 
month. 

Mission  3  81 

Interviews  with  natives  settled  near  the  mission  gave  results 
as  follows: 

Case  1. — Three  years  ago  served  two  months  in  Inhambane,  no  pay. 

Worked  on  the  Rand  and  on  returning  he  and  everyone  else  in  his  party  was 
taxed  three  pounds  at  the  frontier. 

Case  2. —  (A  woman)  was  required  for  a  month  to  cut  and  carry  grass  Women  work, 
for  the  horses  and  mules  at  the  government  post  near  here.  Home  every  night, 
got  nothing. 

Case  3.— A  woman  belonging  to  a  “Banian”  (Indian  trader).  She  was 
caught  by  the  police  but  owing  to  his  intervention  was  released  after  a  day. 

Otherwise  she  would  have  had  to  work  a  month  about  the  headquarters.  As 
soon  as  the  rains  begin  the  farmers  will  be  sending  up  for  men  and  women  to 
hoe  for  them  and  they  will  be  kept  at  work  for  four  thirty-day  months,  getting 
fifty  escudos  ($1.25)  in  all.  “How  we  would  rejoice,”  they  said,  “if  there  were 
no  shibaru!” 

Case  U- — (A  woman)  has  worked  on  shibaru  many  times,  in  some  years 
three  or  four  times,  at  the  post  near  here.  Never  longer  than  four  weeks,  got 
nothing. 

Case  5. — A  man  who  has  worked  on  the  Rand  was  mulcted  two  pounds 
when  he  crossed  the  frontier  into  Portuguese  East  Africa. 


A  woman  missionary  says  that  widows  and  deserted  women  g2 
live  most  of  the  year  in  little  shelters  made  of  plaited  cocoanut 
tree  fronds  in  the  shape  of  a  dog’s  kennel.  When  the  time  of 
assessing  the  hut  tax  comes,  the  poor  creatures  tear  them  down  so  Hut  taxes, 
as  not  to  make  them  liable  to  the  $5.00  hut  tax.  They  live  for  a 
while  with  relatives  or  friends,  then  rebuild.  They  have  to  give 
money  to  the  chief  to  keep  him  from  telling  on  them. 

The  hut  tax  bears  with  crushing  weight  upon  the  poor  and 
the  mission  is  swamped  with  petitions  to  loan  money  to  pay  the 
hut  tax.  Of  course  they  can  not  make  themselves  the  milch  cow 
for  the  Portuguese  Colonial  Government,  so  they  lend  only  in  very 
special  cases.  One  who  can  not  pay  the  hut  tax,  for  example  a 
woman,  will  be  kept  in  jail  indefinitely,  but  if  after  a  year  or  so  it 
becomes  apparent  that  no  money  is  forthcoming  they  give  her 
chances  to  run  away  and  she  runs. 


Page  U7 


88 

The  tax  assessor  goes  to  the  chief  and  asks  him  how  many 
huts  there  are.  If  there  is  an  old  man  or  woman  in  a  hut  the 
chief  may  not  report  it,  especially  if  the  person’s  children  tip 
him. 

An  Agent  Of  The  W.  N.  L.  A. 

Relieved  of  money  at 
the  Border. 

This  man  doubts  if  the  “boy”  from  the  Rand  reaches  home 
with  much  money.  He  may  leave  the  Transvaal  with  a  tidy  sum 
but  he  is  robbed  by  the  official  money  changers  at  the  frontier  and 
by  an  extra  high  fare  on  the  trains,  while  the  Banians  get  his 
money  from  him  by  enticing  him  with  all  sorts  of  gimcracks  and 
stimulating  the  reluctant  buyer  by  making  him  a  gift  of  this  or 
that.  Then  women  hanging  about  the  compound  where  the  men 
are  cared  for  on  their  return,  offer  themselves  to  sex  appetites  long 
famished,  get  their  victim  drunk  and  rob  him.  The  agencies 
separating  him  from  his  savings  are  many  and  effective  and  the 
negro  reaches  home  richer  in  experience,  but  not  in  much  else. 
However,  new  wants  have  been  implanted  which  will  urge  him  to 
enlist  for  the  Rand  again  and  again. 

He  says  that  the  pay  for  compulsory  labor  about  Inhambane 
is  by  no  means  as  much  as  ten  shillings  a  month. 

Summary. 

The  Exploitive  System 

From  focusing  testimony  from  various  persons  at  various  places 
it  appears  that  the  savings  of  the  returning  mine  workers  are 
separated  from  them  in  the  following  ways: 

How  Rand  laborers 
lose  money. 

1.  High  duties  on  everything  bought  on  the  Rand,  even  well-worn  articles 
of  clothing. 

2.  Exchange.  At  the  border  money  is  exchanged  pound  for  pound  when 
the  Portuguese  pound  is  worth  perhaps  three-quarters  of  the  sterling. 

3.  Besides  the  hut  tax,  the  native  returning  from  the  Rand  is  mulcted 
for  the  privilege  of  earning  money  outside  the  country.  Testimony  on  this 
point  is  conflicting  and  is  not  clear  whether  this  payment  is  always  demanded, 
is  authorized,  or  is  uniform  in  amount. 

4.  On  the  government  railways  the  Johannesburg  “boy”  pays  several 
times  as  much  as  other  third-class  passengers.  Thus  from  three  responsible 
parties  I  was  told  that  for  the  sixty  miles  on  the  Inharrime-Inhambane  Railway 
the  returning  “boy”  is  charged  a  pound  for  riding  in  an  open  truck.  My  first 
class  place  cost  me  8/4.  From  Chai  Chai  to  Chicomo  they  pay  one  pound, 
whereas  first  class  fare  is  ten  or  twelve  shillings. 

84 

A  Sugar  Estate  Manager 

Contract  and  voluntary 
labor. 

The  manager  of  a  sugar  estate  informs  us  that  along  the 
Zambesi,  Hornung’s  Sugar  Estates  (English)  pay  nine  shillings 
a  month  for  Nyassaland  contract  laborers,  six  shillings  for  Mozam¬ 
bique  men,  five  shillings  for  their  own  men  (a  Portuguese  shilling 
is  worth  about  19  cents).  The  manager,  who  has  a  thousand 
working  for  him,  got  permission  to  pay  his  men  one-fourth  down 
and  three-fourths  at  the  end  of  six  months,  this  last  paid  through 
the  administrador.  The  volunteer  laborers  get  ten  shillings  at  the 
end  of  the  month.  It  takes  seven  months  to  do  a  six  months’  term. 
This  gentleman  is  extremely  guarded  in  his  statements  but  he 

Page  48 


said  enough  to  indicate  that  not  infrequently  the  wages  the  em¬ 
ployer  pays  to  the  official  in  trust  do  not  reach  the  workers. 

He  is  impressed  by  the  way  the  returning  Rand  worker  is  Rand  laborers, 
despoiled  on  his  way  home.  The  railroads  charge  him  more  than 
double.  The  natives  who  feed  or  lodge  him  on  his  way  home  or 
carry  his  baggage  charge  him  four  prices  and  he  cheerfully  pays 
it  to  show  he  has  money.  He  is  plucked  at  every  turn  and  reaches 
home  well  stripped. 


Highway  Labor  85 

The  construction  of  the  great  trunk  highway,  Chai  Chai  to 
Inharrime,  through  the  wilderness,  must  have  imposed  a  huge 
burden  upon  the  natives  of  this  region.  Dr.  Loram,  Commissioner 
of  Native  Affairs  of  the  South  African  Union,  who  passed  through 
here  four  months  earlier,  told  me  he  never  saw  a  native  smile.  I 
can  not  say  as  much  for  I  have  seen  plenty  of  signs  of  cheerfulness. 

Now  that  the  problem  is  merely  one  of  repair,  perhaps  the  burden 
on  the  natives  is  much  lighter. 


Compared  with  Angola  86 

In  this  province  forced  labor  seems  to  gain  a  real  wage  much  wages  and  taxes 
oftener  than  in  Angola.  On  the  other  hand,  think  of  the  hut  tax 
of  $5.00  as  against  the  Angola  poll  tax  of  $1.50! 


Compared  with  Transvaal 


When  we  resumed  inquiries  at  Lourengo  Marques,  a  European 
resident  testified  that  on  a  Boer  farm  in  the  Transvaal  last  summer 
he  saw  the  blacks  treated  with  a  harshness  which  he  has  never  seen 
here.  The  Dutch  do  not  allow  the  blacks  to  own  land.  Their 
lands  were  all  forfeited  and  became  white  man’s  property.  For 
a  chance  to  occupy  a  bit  of  the  white  man’s  farm  and  raise  food  for 
his  family,  he  has  to  pay  a  perfectly  preposterous  rental  in  labor. 
Here  at  least  the  land  has  never  been  taken  from  under  the  natives’ 
feet.  He  is  of  the  opinion  that  the  great  contrasts  in  the  pay  of 
requisitioned  labor  between  places  is  due  to  differences  in  character 
among  the  administradors. 

Another  resident  testified  that  he  had  seen  a  large  party  of  men 
returning  from  Johannesburg  on  the  train  from  Lourengo  Marques 
to  Xinavane,  laughing  and  singing,  joyous  at  the  prospect  of  meet¬ 
ing  their  wives.  But  they  were  all  arrested  as  they  got  off  the  train 
and  had  no  opportunity  to  visit  their  homes  before  entering  upon  a 
seven  months’  term  of  compulsory  labor.  At  Moamba  only  about 
forty  miles  distant  from  Lourengo  Marques,  he  was  assured  that 
such  laborers  are  paid  only  five  shillings  a  month. 


Ownership  of  land. 


87 


Arrested  on  arrival  at 
home. 


On  a  Plantation  88 

A  young  South  African  cotton  planter,  plantation  about  sixty 
miles  away  from  Lourengo  Marques,  has  110  laborers,  all  volun¬ 
teers.  The  farmers  prefer  voluntary  to  contract  laborers  because 
the  latter  do  not  wish  to  work  and  have  no  fear  of  losing  their 


Page  49 


Voluntary  and  contract 
labor  compared. 


89 

Can  these  not 
be  realized. 


90 


Sugar  company. 


Testimony  of  an 
American  business 
man. 


jobs.  He  pays  twenty-five  shillings  a  month  and  provides  corn  and 
beans  which  cost  him  about  10  cents  a  day  a  man.  The  Government 
will  contract  laborers  at  twelve  shillings  a  month  but  these  will 
soon  run  away  and  seek  a  job  in  Lourengo  Marques.  If  you  pay 
fifteen  shillings  some  will  stay.  If  you  contract  to  pay  a  pound  a 
month  you  get  pretty  fair  men.  He  is  not  allowed  to  pay  more 
than  one  shilling  per  month  direct  to  the  shibaru  men.  The  rest 
must  be  turned  over  to  the  Department  of  Native  Affairs  to  be 
paid  to  the  laborers.  He  thinks  very  little  of  it  reaches  the  boys, 
at  least  they  say  so.  It  depends  on  the  character  of  the  admini¬ 
strator.  This,  together  with  the  practice  of  the  Portuguese  farmers 
of  kicking  the  volunteer  worker  who  after  two  or  three  months 
of  service  asks  for  his  pay,  spoils  labor.  They  are  suspicious  and 
unwilling  even  when  they  are  assured  they  will  receive  a  pound 
a  month.  He  thinks  that  in  the  circumscriptions  about  Lourengo 
Marques  perhaps  nine-tenths  of  the  boys  get  their  stipulated  pay. 
But  off  at  a  distance  it  is  possible  that  nine-tenths  of  the  boys  get 
only  a  part  of  what  is  due  them  or  nothing  at  all. 

Ideals 

In  Lourengo  Marques  we  are  told  that  the  distinguished  Col. 
Freire  d’Andrade,  who  when  he  was  High  Commissioner  of  Portu¬ 
guese  East  Africa  about  fifteen  years  ago  took  the  position  that 
not  more  than  three  months  of  labor  should  be  required  of  a  native 
in  a  year,  that  labor  on  one’s  own  farm  should  count,  that  forced 
labor  should  be  properly  paid  for,  that  the  native  who  has  rendered 
it  should  feel  secure  for  the  rest  of  the  year  and  that  work  on  the 
Rand  should  be  taken  account  of. 

Mozambique 

The  scene  of  investigation  now  shifts  to  Beira  and  its  tributary 
territory  650  miles  north  of  Lourengo  Marques.  A  visit  to  the 
plantation  and  mill  of  the  Busi  Sugar  Company  three  hours  up 
the  Busi  River,  brings  out  that  the  company  has  3,000  natives  in 
its  employ.  The  German  chemist  who  has  been  here  a  year  says 
that  three-fourths  are  contract  laborers,  one-fourth  volunteers;  the 
latter  paid  a  pound  and  a  half  a  month,  the  former  a  pound. 
Their  contract  runs  from  nine  to  twelve  months  and  they  are  paid 
directly  by  the  company.  The  sugar  expert,  a  Mauritian  who  has 
been  here  four  years,  says  that  the  volunteers  get  ten  shillings  a 
month  and  that  the  contract  laborers  are  signed  up  for  three  years 
with  the  Mozambique  Company,  then  are  exempt  for  five  years, 
after  which  they  may  be  required  to  work  another  three-year  period. 
(It  may  be  that  the  laborers  he  refers  to  are  natives  settled  on  the 
land  embraced  in  the  concession  of  the  Busi  Company.) 

An  American  business  man  of  Beira,  very  familiar  with  con¬ 
ditions  here,  declares  that  the  natives  on  the  Busi  Sugar  Estates, 
virtually  have  to  work  all  the  year.  Exercising  the  old  prazo 
rights  the  owners  require  them  to  work  six  months  in  the  year 
and  this  period  is  of  course  the  period  when  the  cane  is  to  be  put 
in  and  tended.  But  this  is  just  the  time  when  the  native  ought  to 


Page  50 


be  putting  in  and  tending  his  maize.  And,  since  he  has  no  chance 
to  grow  a  food  crop  for  himself,  he  has  to  feed  his  family  on 
bought  food,  so,  when  he  has  finished  a  six  months’  term  of  com¬ 
pulsory  service,  he  is  practically  under  the  necessity  of  signing 
on  for  another  six  months.  Nevertheless,  if  he  wants  to  knock  off 
and  spend  a  month  with  his  family  he  will  be  allowed  to  do  so. 

It  will  not  do  to  drive  the  native  with  too  tight  a  rein. 

Recruits  at  Villa  Machado  91 

While  proceeding  along  the  Beira  and  Mashonaland  railroad,  Recruits  neglected, 
we  interviewed  at  a  station  about  seventy  miles  up  a  lot  of  blacks 
being  hauled  in  open  trucks  on  a  goods  train  from  Beira  to 
Macaquece,  a  hundred  miles  further  on.  They  are  the  same 
whom  we  saw  debark  yesterday  at  Beira  from  the  packed  launches 
in  which  they  had  been  brought  down  by  sea  from  Sofala.  They 
rolled  into  this  station  at  five  in  the  afternoon.  At  six  they  inquired 
of  my  interpreter,  when  they  would  go  on.  We  inquired  and 
learned  that  they  are  to  lie  here  until  midnight  when  they  will  be 
picked  up  by  another  train.  Nobody  had  informed  them  what 
was  to  become  of  them.  Promptly  they  leave  the  trucks,  build 
fires  and  proceed  to  cook  their  own  food,  for  they  have  eaten 
nothing  since  morning.  This  neglect  of  them,  indifference  as  to 
whether  they  eat  or  famish,  sleep  or  sit  up,  is  the  treatment  of 
slaves.  They  are  contracted  by  the  Government  for  a  year  and 
expect  to  receive  ten  shillings  a  month  as  others  from  Sofala  have 
done.  They  complained  of  such  wages  in  comparison  with  the 
three  pounds  ten  a  month  they  might  earn  on  the  Rand.  The  in¬ 
terpreter  asked  them  why  they  didn’t  go  to  the  Rand  to  work  and 
they  replied  that  they  are  registered,  each  in  his  own  circumscrip¬ 
tion,  and  are  called  out  by  the  commandant  to  render  labor  service. 

They  have  no  idea  whether  they  are  to  work  in  the  mines  or  on 
the  farms. 

These  poor  fellows,  torn  from  their  families  and  carried  to  an 
unknown  destination  to  perform  they  know  not  what  work,  left 
out  in  the  open  trucks  with  darkness  coming  on  and  no  instruc¬ 
tions  given  them  as  to  their  opportunities  for  drink,  food  or  sleep, 
impress  one  as  very  forlorn. 


The  Views  of  British  Planters 

For  fifty  miles  along  the  railway  about  half  way  from  Beira 
to  Rhodesia  stretches  a  belt  of  excellent  cotton  soil  on  which 
perhaps  sixty  planters  have  settled,  about  half  of  them  being 
British.  It  happens  that  at  the  very  time  of  our  visit  the  abhor-  protest  of  British 
rence  of  the  British  planters  for  the  Portuguese  labor  system  has  planters, 
come  to  a  head.  The  British  have  united  in  an  association  and 
are  making  certain  representations  to  the  Governor,  who  happens 
to  be  traveling  through,  on  the  very  day  we  visit  Villa  Perry.  Thus 
it  happens  that  we  are  able  to  get  from  the  leading  planters  every 
aspect  of  the  question  of  native  labor. 

Mr.  C — ,  a  British  planter  at  Cafumpe,  117  miles  up  from  92 
Beira,  says  that  their  contracted  laborers  cost  them  a  Portuguese 


Page  51 


Desire  to  abolish 
forced  labor. 


Recruiting. 


Railway  workers. 


Farmers. 


pound  ($3.75)  a  month.  The  wages  are  turned  over  to  the 
Mozambique  Company  which  contracts  the  boys  and  by  it  is 
paid  to  their  families  every  month.  He  believes  they  really  get 
the  wages.  The  British  farmers  find  the  system  of  forced  labor  too 
much  like  slavery  and  wish  the  Government  to  abolish  it.  The 
Portuguese  farmers,  are  not  with  them,  for  they  cheat  and  impose 
upon  the  volunteer  laborers  so  much  that  they  could  hardly  main¬ 
tain  their  labor  force  without  compulsion.  The  shibaru  laborers 
work  some  for  a  six  months’  term  and  some  for  a  year  and  are 
free  for  an  equal  length  of  time  before  being  taken  again. 

93  Mr.  T — ,  who  was  for  some  years  warder  of  convicts  at 
Johannesburg,  says  that  the  “recruiting”  of  the  W.  N.  L.  A.  in 
Portuguese  East  Africa  consists  often  in  bribing  the  chief  to  furnish 
them  the  desired  number  of  men.  He  sees  that  they  are  caught 
and  delivered,  sometimes  tied  up.  He  insists  that  the  Portuguese 
system  of  obtaining  native  labor  is  at  bottom  not  different  from 
that  of  the  British  and  South  African,  who  pay  the  chief  to  use 
his  authority  to  get  them  the  recruits  they  want.  From  the  point 
of  view  of  the  native  laborer,  however,  his  work  is  not  so  compul¬ 
sory  as  that  of  the  shibaru  laborer. 

94  Working  Groups 

The  railroad  track  workers  are  volunteers  who  receive  from 
seventeen  to  twenty-five  shillings  a  calendar  month  and  their  food. 
A  culvert  gang  on  the  highway  stated  that  they  were  recruited  by 
the  Mozambique  Company,  have  worked  six  thirty-day  months 
and  must  work  as  much  more;  get  thirteen  shillings  sterling  a 
thirty-day  month.  After  they  have  been  at  home  six  months  they 
will  be  liable  to  be  called  again. 

Four  workers  whom  we  met  on  the  road  say  they  get  eight 
shillings  sterling  a  month.  They  would  rather  not  work,  prefer 
to  be  at  home,  for  their  wives  are  troubled  to  have  them  away. 

Men  from  Sofala  near  Macequece  will  have  to  work  a  year. 
The  farmer  will  pay  for  them  twelve,  sixteen  and  twenty  shillings 
Portuguese  a  month,  of  which  four  shillings  will  go  to  the 
Mozambique  Company  for  recruiting  expenses.  The  rest  will  be 
paid  every  month  to  the  worker  by  the  head  of  the  recruiting 
office.  The  farmer  pays  the  money  to  this  head,  who  deducts  the 
four  shillings  fee  and  any  sums  which  have  been  advanced  to  the 
man  when  he  is  recruited.  In  this  district,  owing  to  the  ease  of 
decamping  into  Rhodesia  where  compulsory  labor  is  unknown,  the 
term  of  shibaru  is  only  six  months. 

We  passed  five  volunteers  employed  by  a  Portuguese  farmer 
and  found  they  had  a  dozen  labor  tickets  with  them.  These  were 
for  thirty  days  each  and  the  pay  ran  from  fifteen  to  twenty 
shillings,  Portuguese,  for  simple  hands,  to  four  pounds  for  drivers 
and  four  pounds  four  shillings  for  foremen. 

95  A  Greek  Farmer 

Mr.  K —  says  he  gets  his  labor  for  a  year  (thirteen  months), 
paying  about  a  pound  a  month.  He  pays  the  money  to  the  official 


Page  52 


and  the  official  is  supposed  to  pay  it  to  the  native;  the  native  gets 

only  ten  shillings  a  work-month,  the  rest  of  his  wages  to  be  paid  Wages  not  paid  in  full, 
him  when  he  gets  home.  Mr.  K —  thinks  that  often  the  blacks 
get  only  a  portion  of  what  is  due  them,  sometimes  only  ten  shillings 
Portuguese  for  six  months’  work. 

After  a  year’s  service  the  man,  when  he  returns  home,  has 
absolutely  no  protection  against  being  taken  again  soon.  He  calls 
up  a  native  who  says  that  he  has  worked  ten  months  and  has 
three  months  more  to  work;  had  \y2  pounds  advanced  to  him  and 
has  had  2  pounds  paid  him.  He  should  get  sixteen  shillings  (pay¬ 
ing  four  shillings  to  the  Mozambique  Company  for  recruiting 
charges)  for  each  month  worked.  But  the  natives  complain  gen¬ 
erally  that  they  do  not  get  it.  Mr.  K —  does  not  care  to  inquire 
into  it  lest  the  Company  should  “get  back”  at  him.  It  is  significant 
that  the  volunteers,  who  really  get  their  pay,  work  for  less  wages 
than  the  contract  laborers.  If  the  latter  really  got  what  they  are 
supposed  to  earn,  why  should  anyone  take  ten  or  fifteen  shillings 
a  month  as  a  free  laborer  when  as  a  contract  laborer  he  could  get 
sixteen  shillings? 


Views  of  Planters 


The  blacks  here  tell  the  planters  that  they  are  just  slaves  of 
the  Mozambique  Company.  On  the  Zambesi  the  terms  and 
system  are  the  same  as  here,  but  the  pay  runs  less. 

A  young  Englishman  working  in  a  maize  mill  says  that  the 
contract  laborers  here  come  from  a  considerable  distance,  Sena 
on  the  Zambesi.  They  put  in  360  working  days,  which  means  four¬ 
teen  calendar  months.  For  the  ordinary  worker  the  employer  pays 
a  Portuguese  pound  ($3.75)  a  month.  He  thinks  that  of  this  pound 
the  worker  gets  ten  shillings.  To  him  the  system  appears  much 
like  slavery.  It  is  his  impression  that  a  native  who  has  put  in 
fourteen  months  will  be  unmolested  for  six  months  thereafter. 

A  cotton  planter,  Mr.  B — ,  judges  that  in  recent  years  50,000 
natives  have  left  this  part  of  the  country  for  Rhodesia,  so  that  the 
evil  of  compulsory  labor  is  curing  itself. 

Mr.  S — ,  a  cotton  planter,  says  that  the  blacks  are  leaving 
for  Rhodesia  and  Nyassaland  in  great  numbers.  The  British 
farmers  want  the  pass  system,  so  that  a  native  who  has  worked  six 
months  for  a  white  man  shall  be  exempt  from  being  taken  again  in 
the  course  of  the  ensuing  six  months. 

The  worker  gets  an  advance  of  one,  two  or  three  pounds  when 
he  is  recruited.  After  two  or  three  months  the  paymaster  of  the 
Mozambique  Company  comes  round  and  pays  the  boys  ten 
shillings  Portuguese  a  calendar  month  and  at  intervals  thereafter. 
But  the  last  two  months  of  his  work  are  not  paid  for  until  he 
reaches  home.  Then  he  ought  to  receive  ten  shillings  for  each 
of  the  last  two  months  and  six  shillings  for  each  of  the  whole 
twelve  months  less  the  original  advance.  The  question  in  the 
mind  of  the  British  farmer  is,  does  he  get  it? 

The  British  farmers  want  to  do  away  with  forced  labor  and 
in  its  place  establish  voluntary  labor  subject  to  a  pass  system. 


96 


Wages  deducted. 


97 

Depopulation. 


Are  wages  fully  paid? 


98 


Page  53 


A  pass  system 
wanted. 


99 


No  complaint. 


100 


Continuous  compulsory 
labor. 


Children  substitutes. 


101 


Charges  against 
Greeks. 


Every  native  should  bear  a  pass  and  when  he  pays  his  tax  his 
pass  should  show  that  he  has  worked  for  somebody  six  months  in 
the  course  of  the  fiscal  year.  If  his  pass  doesn’t  show  this,  he  should 
be  required  to  work  six  months  directly  for  the  Company  but  not 
let  out  to  farmers.  The  farmers  would  need  to  make  a  contract  of 
say  three  months,  registered  at  the  nearest  office,  which  would 
entitle  them  to  have  the  volunteer  worker  arrested  and  returned 
to  the  service  in  case  he  quit  without  due  cause  before  his  contract 
had  been  fulfilled. 

At  present  if  a  contract  laborer  runs  away  the  Mozambique 
Company  sends  to  his  circumscription  and  has  him  sent  back  to 
work  out  his  term;  but  he  is  not  beaten,  jailed,  or  fined.  If  a 
worker  runs  away  from  a  farmer  who  has  the  reputation  of  being 
a  bad  master,  the  company  may  do  nothing  or  it  may  send  the 
man  to  a  different  master.  The  Mozambique  Company  sees  that 
the  men  get  some  justice  for  they  are  worried  by  the  emigration  of 
the  dissatisfied  natives  to  British  territory. 

Mr.  S —  lined  up  his  fifteen  contract  laborers  in  his  yard 
and  had  the  native  boss  question  them  as  to  their  experiences  with 
contract  labor. 

They  say  that  when  they  contract  they  get  three  pounds  in 
Sena,  but  only  two  pounds  at  Gorongoza  which  is  nearer.  The 
further  they  have  to  come,  the  more  they  can  get  in  advance. 
When  they  return  home  they  get  two,  three  or  four  pounds  accord¬ 
ing  to  what  is  coming  to  them  after  deducting  the  two  or  three 
pounds  advanced.  None  of  them  complain  of  any  of  their  earn¬ 
ings  being  withheld. 

They  say  that  after  a  man  has  finished  his  contract  he  can 
ordinarily  stop  at  home  unmolested  only  up  to  about  four  months. 
The  police  may  call  for  workers  several  times  a  year  and  some¬ 
times  so  many  are  called  that  men  have  to  fill  the  requisition  who 
have  only  recently  completed  a  term  of  service.  Thus  compulsory 
labor  becomes  almost  continuous.  For  example,  a  native  who 
returned  in  December  was  called  here  in  April.  Their  women 
do  not  have  to  work  on  the  roads  or  otherwise  for  the  Mozambique 
Company  unless  the  men  have  run  away. 

The  hut  tax  is  one  pound  Portuguese.  If  the  man  has  two 
wives  and  two  huts  he  pays  two  pounds.  They  say  that  the  workers 
on  the  Zambesi  sugar  estates  are  as  well  treated  and  paid  as  here. 

When  there  is  a  shortage  of  workers,  lads  as  young  as  13  years 
are  taken  by  the  chief  to  do  contract  labor.  The  father  gets  the 
money  advanced,  passes  the  physical  examination  and  gets  booked, 
then  sends  his  son  in  his  place.  This  is  how  mere  children  get  into 
these  labor  groups. 

Mr.  L — ,  a  British  cotton  planter,  says  Greeks  are  a  curse  to 
this  district.  With  the  British  farmers  the  laborers  are  generally 
contented.  The  Greek  farmers  and  the  Banians  are  the  worst,  then 
Italians,  then  Portuguese.  The  Greek  can’t  bear  to  see  one  of  his 
blacks  unoccupied.  He  works  them  on  Sundays  and  gives  them 
poor  food.  Volunteer  laborers  get  15  shillings  a  month,  the  forced 
laborers  net  16  shillings.  Mr.  L —  has  at  least  30  families  settled 


Page  54 


on  his  estate  which  have  their  own  huts  and  gardens.  The  men 
work  only  part  of  the  year  and  get  15  shillings  a  month.  Some 
Greeks  and  the  baser  Portuguese  will  kick  off  their  place  the 
volunteer  who  is  so  bold  as  to  ask  for  his  pay. 

Mr.  L —  mustered  five  Sena  laborers  and  we  questioned  them 
as  to  their  receipts  from  past  terms  of  compulsory  labor.  Each 
should  have  had  192  shillings  for  his  stint  of  twelve  30-day  months. 
What  they  actually  received  was  as  follows:  120  sh.;  140  sh.;  120 
sh. ;  120  sh. ;  140  sh. 

The  men  say  they  can  stop  at  home  for  six  months  after  they 
have  done  a  term.  They  walk  here,  spending  14  days  on  the  way. 
For  this  they  get  food  but  no  pay. 

Questioning  a  group  of  laborers  on  another  farm  we  learn 
that  five  are  from  Chembe  near  Nyassaland.  They  are  brought 
here  on  steamer  but  have  to  spend  a  month  walking  home.  The 
company  gives  them  food  for  the  trip. 

An  English  railway  foreman  told  that  when  he  was  working 
for  a  big  construction  company  down  near  Villa  Machado  he  had 
some  trouble  with  six  of  his  blacks  and  turned  them  over  to  the 
Portuguese  authorities.  Sometime  afterward  he  saw  from  their 
labor  cards  that  each  of  them  had  15  shillings  coming  to  them. 
He  sent  the  money  and  names  to  the  commandant  at  Villa  Machado. 
Presently  some  of  these  blacks  called  upon  him  and  he  learned 
that  none  of  them  had  received  any  money.  So  the  superintendent 
told  the  foreman  to  pay  them  again.  He,  as  well  as  another  fore¬ 
man  with  him,  considers  that  a  part  of  the  wages  is  regularly  held 
back  by  the  officials. 

Mr.  W — ,  an  English  planter,  thinks  that  in  the  last  five  years 
70,000  negroes  have  filtered  out  of  this  province  into  Rhodesia 
and  Nyassaland  to  escape  forced  labor.  He  would  not  abolish 
forced  labor  at  once,  but  would  announce  its  abandonment  after 
two  years  in  the  hope  that  many  of  the  emigres  would  return  and 
thus  replenish  the  supply  of  free  labor.  If  the  government  should 
adopt  the  suggested  policy  of  dropping  the  requisition  of  laborers 
and  instead  require  each  native  to  do  four  months’  labor  a  year,  he 
fears  lest  the  natives  nearly  all  apply  for  jobs  in  the  cool  season 
and  leave  the  farmer  short-handed  when  the  planting  season 
arrives. 

D — ,  a  Greek  store-keeper,  opposes  doing  away  with  forced 
labor  and  substituting  the  pass  system  on  the  basis  of  four  months 
of  labor  each  year,  pass  to  be  submitted  when  taxes  are  paid.  He 
anticipates  there  would  be  a  surfeit  of  labor  in  the  cool  and  dry 
season  when  the  farmer  is  not  in  great  need  of  labor  and  a  dearth 
of  it  in  the  hot  rainy  season  when  the  crops  must  be  got  in.  He 
fears  lest  the  farmer  who  in  December  finds  himself  short  of 
labor,  would  succumb  to  the  temptation  to  furnish  a  pass  (certify¬ 
ing  to  four  months’  labor)  to  the  native  who  would  consent  to  work 
for  him  for  two  months. 

Mr.  C — ,  an  English  planter,  says  that  the  blacks  on  the 
Mozambique  coast  get  now  only  3  or  4  shillings  sterling  a  month; 
if  brought  here,  they  would  get  15  shillings.  Eight  thousand  of 


102 


Short  pay. 


103 


Officials  retain  wages. 


104 


Depopulation. 


Labor  seasons. 


105 


106 


Page  55 


Competition. 


107 


Charges  not 
substantiated. 


A  long  view. 


108 

Food. 


A  native  rising. 


Treatment  of 
prisoners. 


Sheer  terrorism. 


these  are  now  available  for  a  year  contract.  The  peak  of  farmer 
need  comes  in  the  reaping  season,  April  to  August,  which  is  cool 
and  dry. 

The  Greeks  and  Portuguese  have  been  giving  their  workers 
long  hours  and  poor  food;  hence,  they  fear  that  without  compulsory 
labor  they  are  likely  to  be  left  in  the  lurch.  They  are  not  ready 
to  come  to  the  British  standard  of  treatment  and  compete  with  the 
British  planters  on  their  own  terms.  The  Mozambique  Company 
brings  in  the  distant  boys  by  rail,  lest  they  should  get  away.  They 
can  trust  them  to  walk  home,  so  they  let  them  walk. 

Mr.  C —  and  other  Britons  have  investigated  the  charges  of 
wages  stealing  and  they  find  few  of  the  charges  substantiated.  They 
hesitate  to  make  any  general  statement  that  the  officials  do  not 
pay  over  to  the  workers  all  the  wages  due  them.  He  observes  that 
last  year  the  Zambesi  sugar  estates  turned  over  to  the  officials 
wages  to  the  amount  of  75,000  pounds  sterling. 

He  does  not  base  the  case  of  the  British  cotton  planters  about 
here  chiefly  on  humanitarian  sentiment,  but  on  the  long  distance 
view  that  so  many  of  the  natives  of  this  part  of  the  country  are 
migrating  into  British  territory  in  order  to  put  themselves  beyond 
the  reach  of  Portuguese  labor  exactions,  that  labor  famine  around 
here  is  inevitable  unless  the  odious  system  of  compulsory  labor  is 
done  away  with.  They  insist  that  the  Greek  and  Portuguese 
farmers  are  short-sighted. 

Another  British  farmer,  Mr.  B — ,  says  that  the  kind  of  food 
some  of  the  farmers  furnish  their  laborers  is  a  shame — corn  meal 
nearly  black  with  dirt,  beans  unmarketable. 

The  native  rising  about  here  during  the  war  sprang  from  the 
fact  that  a  lot  of  forced  laborers,  having  fulfilled  their  contracts 
and  expecting  to  be  taken  home,  found  themselves  in  Beira  harbor 
on  a  steamer  taking  them  to  serve  in  German  East  Africa.  Some 
who  jumped  overboard  and  tried  to  escape  by  swimming  were  shot 
from  the  boat.  While  the  Portuguese  about  here  fled,  the  British 
all  stayed  on  their  farms  and  were  unmolested.  He  believes  that 
wages  robbing  by  the  officials  of  the  Mozambique  Company  is 
almost  universal. 

He  saw  a  big  batch  of  black  prisoners  being  taken  in  chains 
to  Beira  after  the  crushing  of  the  uprising  in  1918.  The  food  of 
the  natives  had  been  so  systematically  reduced  that  the  legs  of  the 
prisoners  were  no  bigger  than  one’s  wrists.  While  in  custody  these 
prisoners  were  given  nothing  to  eat  and  were  dying  all  the  time. 
A  band  of  British  soldiers  on  a  train  were  so  incensed  by  Portuguese 
cruelty  that  they  came  near  starting  something.  From  mistaken 
kindness  they  gave  of  their  hardtack  to  the  famishing  wretches  and 
some  of  them  died  of  it. 

On  my  return  to  Beira  a  Briton  interested  in  the  economic 
development  of  the  colony  and  extraordinarily  well  acquainted  with 
conditions  (in  order  not  to  identify  him  we  may  not  describe  him 
farther)  declared  to  us  that  the  Portuguese  who  brag  that  they 
have  solved  the  native  problem  maintain  a  system  of  sheer  terror¬ 
ism.  They  are  extremely  heartless  and  cruel  in  their  treatment  of 


Page  56 


the  natives.  He  points  out  the  iniquity  of  their  treatment  of  the 
volunteer.  He  may  have  worked  steadily  for  a  white  man  for  a 
year  as  a  volunteer.  Yet  when  he  returns  to  pass  a  while  with  his 
family — as  who  wouldn’t? — his  past  labor  gives  him  not  the  least 
immunity  from  being  seized  for  shibaru  any  time,  even  on  his  way 
home. 


Page  57 


PART  III 


Aim  to  assemble 
evidence. 


Impressions. 


State  serfdom. 


Fields  neglected. 


Wages  embezzled. 


Skill  discouraged. 


Road  making  overdone. 


Labor  stolen. 


Conclusion 

In  our  investigation  our  single  aim  has  been  to  draw  out  and 
assemble  the  pertinent  facts.  In  gathering  facts  our  policy  has  been 
to  interrogate,  first  of  all,  the  natives  themselves — who  more  than 
any  others  are  deeply  concerned  with  the  system  of  compulsory 
labor  and  have  their  significant  individual  experiences  to  contribute 
— and  secondly  to  question  those  whites  who  are  in  a  position  to 
know  the  facts  and  may  be  presumed  to  have  no  private  interest  in 
concealing  or  distorting  them.  While  the  evidence  we  have  amassed 
may  seem  to  justify  a  severe  condemnation  of  the  system  under 
which  native  labor  is  exacted  in  Portuguese  Africa,  there  is  much 
evidence  in  our  report  which  shows  that  we  have  been  as  willing  to 
set  down  favorable  statements  when  we  could  do  so,  as  to  set  down 
unfavorable  statements. 

Since  the  foregoing  embodies  substantially  all  the  relevant 
data  we  were  able  to  secure,  anyone  who  studies  it  attentively  will 
be  in  a  position  to  arrive  at  conclusions  for  himself.  However, 
inasmuch  as  we  shall  be  expected  to  communicate  the  impressions 
made  upon  us  in  the  course  of  our  ten  weeks  of  investigation,  we 
offer  the  following,  which  applies  particularly  to  Angola. 

1.  The  labor  system — virtually  state  serfdom — which  has 
grown  up  in  the  Portuguese  Colonies  in  recent  years  often  claims 
so  much  of  the  natives’  time  and  strength  that  they  are  no  longer 
able  to  give  adequate  attention  to  the  production  of  food  in  their 
own  gardens  and  fields  (See  paragraphs,  2,  3,  7,  10,  14,  16,  18,  26, 
32,  33,  41,  53,  54,  55,  59,  60,  61,  63,  64,  66,  73,  76,  78,  87, 
90,  91,  100,  108,  109.) 

2.  There  is  little  evidence  that  any  considerable  part  of  the 
wages  turned  over  in  trust  to  the  officials  by  the  employers  of 
natives  hired  from  the  Government  actually  reaches  the  hands 
of  those  to  whom  it  belongs.  It  appears  that  the  typical  thing 
is  for  the  earnings  of  these  commandeered  laborers  to  be  embezzled. 
(See  paragraphs  3,  5,  9,  13,  14,  16,  34,  49,  67,  84,  88,  92,  95,  97, 
102,  103,  107,  108.) 

3.  The  amount  of  unpaid  labor  exacted  of  skilled  natives 
is  not  infrequently  so  excessive  that  the  young  men  see  nothing  to 
be  gained  by  their  acquiring  skill  in  the  missionary  schools.  (See 
paragraphs  27,  33,  35,  41.) 

4.  Motor  roads  have  been  extended  far  beyond  the  needs 
of  the  Colony  and  the  construction  of  such  roads  by  conscripted, 
unpaid,  unrationed  natives — for  the  most  part  women — with  only 
the  most  primitive  implements,  imposes  in  some  cases  an  almost 
crushing  burden.  (See  paragraphs  7,  10,  11,  12,  18,  19,  21,  23,  39, 
44,  46,  53,  58,  60,  64,  65,  85.) 

5.  There  appears  to  be  wide  spread  labor  stealing,  i.e.,  the 
planter  arbitrarily  refuses  to  give  credit  or  pay  for  certain  days 
or  half-days  of  labor  which  have  been  rendered  him.  We  heard 


Page  58 


of  no  effort  made  by  any  official  to  curb  this  despicable  practice. 
(See  paragraphs  15,  28,  32,  34,  36,  47,  55,  62,  66.) 

6.  The  official  does  not  appear  to  be  in  a  strong  position 
with  respect  to  his  fellow  nationals,  the  traders  and  the  planters, 
and  hence  rarely  ventures  to  stand  up  for  the  rights  of  the  natives 
as  against  the  claims  of  a  white  man.  The  blacks  feel  that  the 
Portuguese  are  leagued  against  them  and  that  there  is  no  re¬ 
course  against  the  white  man’s  violence  and  injustice.  (See 
paragraphs  6,  37,  38,  40,  48,  50,  51,  55,  57,  59,  62,  70,  71,  79, 
101,  106.) 

7.  The  native  policemen  ( Cipaes ),  utilized  among  stranger 
or  enemy  tribes,  grossly  abuse  their  authority  for  purposes  of  lust, 
spite  or  extortion.  There  is  no  regular  channel  provided  by 
which  the  complaints  of  the  natives  thus  wronged  may  be  brought 
to  the  attention  of  the  officials.  (See  paragraphs  25,  42,  46,  49, 
59,  63.) 

8.  The  Government  provides  practically  nothing  in  the  way 
of  schools,  medical  care,  emergency  relief  or  justice  against  the 
white  trader,  for  the  people  of  the  villages  as  recompense  for 
the  heavy  burden  of  unrequited  toil  it  lays  upon  them.  (See 
paragraphs  37,  38,  42,  45,  50,  59,  60,  78,  79.) 

9.  The  treatment  of  the  natives  in  Portuguese  territory  com¬ 
pares  so  unfavorably  with  that  experienced  by  the  natives  in 
Rhodesia  or  in  Belgian  Congo  that  there  is  a  strong  tendency  to 
emigrate  across  the  frontier.  (See  paragraphs  43,  56,  59,  97,  98, 
104,  107.) 

10.  In  Portuguese  East  Africa  the  amount  and  manner  of 
collection  of  the  hut  tax  impose  severe  hardships  upon  the  natives. 
(See  paragraphs  66,  69,  75,  76,  77,  82,  85.) 

Alternative  Lines  of  Colonial  Development 

Before  the  whites  came  these  African  natives  had  made  con¬ 
siderable  progress  in  the  industrial  arts.  They  smelted  iron  and 
native  smiths  made  tools,  implements  and  weapons  of  iron.  They 
had  chickens,  pigs,  goats,  sheep,  cattle  and  dogs.  They  grew 
various  crops.  They  were  backward  chiefly  in  making  cloth. 
Now  for  such  people  one  path  of  advance  is  the  development  of 
cultivation  by  the  natives  themselves.  Mission  schools  may 
implant  new  wants — for  clothing,  better  homes,  cleanliness,  sani¬ 
tation,  decency,  chairs,  tables,  raised  beds,  cook  stoves,  schooling 
for  children,  eventually  perhaps  newspapers,  books,  amusements. 
At  the  same  time  the  mission  schools  will  show  how  to  produce 
the  means  of  gratifying  these  new  wants.  The  brighter  youths 
will  learn  carpentry,  masonry,  tailoring,  iron  work,  brick-making, 
weaving,  gardening,  farming,  poultry  raising,  bee  keeping.  The 
girls  will  learn  to  cook,  sew,  keep  house,  spin,  make  garments, 
weave  baskets.  The  natives  will  be  made  acquainted  with  better 
methods  of  farming,  better  types  of  implements,  improved  varieties 
of  domestic  plants,  fowls,  animals.  The  world  outside  will  obtain 
the  cotton,  sugar,  coffee,  rice,  cocoa,  palm  nuts  and  sisal  which 
this  part  of  Africa  is  fitted  to  produce.  But  from  them  the  blacks 


Opposition  of  traders 
and  planters. 


Police  abuse  authority. 


No  medical  care,  or 
justice. 


Depopulation. 


Hut  taxes. 


Development  of  native 
peoples. 


Page  59 


Barbarism. 


The  choice. 


will  obtain  a  due  equivalent  so  that  here  a  decent  Christian 
civilization  will  develop. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Government  may  by  grants  create 
great  estates  of  from  10,000  to  30,000  acres,  tilled  by  unpaid 
conscripted  natives  working  under  the  hippo  lash.  Cowed  and 
discouraged  the  natives  will  have  no  incentive  to  acquire  skill. 
As  life  becomes  harder  for  them,  the  shoots  of  the  higher  civiliza¬ 
tion  among  them  will  wither.  They  will  take  up  with  vices 
which  help  them  to  forget  their  hopeless  lot.  The  dominant 
whites  will  object  to  the  missions  teaching  the  “niggers,”  “putting 
notions  into  their  heads,”  making  them  “uppish”  and  “above 
their  station.”  The  fazendas  (estates  )will  come  eventually  into 
the  hands  of  the  more  ruthless  whites,  for  they  can  make  more 
money  out  of  them  than  the  humane  sort  can,  and  will  be  able 
to  offer  more  purchase  money  for  them  than  the  humane  can  afford 
to  refuse.  These  unscrupulous  and  cruel  whites  will  go  about  in 
motor  cars,  snatch  comely  black  maids  to  gratify  their  lust,  in¬ 
timidate  the  blacks  with  palmatoro  and  chicote,  and  maintain 
handsome  motor  roads,  plantation  homes  and  government  build¬ 
ings  with  unrequited  native  labor.  In  the  use  of  machinery,  the 
applications  of  science  to  industry  and  the  adoption  of  luxuries, 
this  regime  will  look  like  civilization;  but  in  reality  it  will  be 
but  a  veneered  barbarism. 

Which  of  these  two  types  will  prevail  depends  upon  things 
which  are  yet  to  happen.  It  is  certain,  however,  that  one  type 
or  the  other  will  win.  An  African  colony  cannot  persist  half  the 
one  thing  and  half  the  other.  Free  labor  and  forced  labor  will 
no  more  mix  than  oil  and  water.  Provide  the  planter  with  as 
much  forced  labor  as  he  requires  and  the  hours,  pace,  treatment 
and  pay  of  labor  will  become  such  that  no  free  laborer  in  his 
senses  will  take  employment  with  him. 

Edward  Alsworth  Ross 
Madison,  Wisconsin,  U.  S.  A. 


Page  60 


APPENDIX 


Angola  or  Portuguese  West  Africa  has  480,000  square  miles  and  a  population  estimated 
to  be  three  millions  at  least.  The  number  of  whites  is  said  to  be  from  twenty  to  thirty 
thousand.  On  the  North  and  Northeast  its  boundary  marches  with  that  of  the  Belgian 
Congo.  On  the  East  it  has  Northern  Rhodesia  for  a  neighbor,  while  on  the  South  it 
borders  on  Southwest  Africa.  The  interior  is  a  plateau  rising  to  6,000  feet  above  the 
sea  so  that,  although  it  is  well  within  the  tropics,  the  climate  is  not  at  all  trying  to  whites. 
In  the  uplands  the  chief  food  crops  of  the  natives  are  manioc,  maize,  beans,  millet,  ground 
nuts,  potatoes,  sweet  potatoes  and  rice.  Prominent  among  the  plantation  products  are 
coffee,  cocoa,  cotton,  palm  nuts,  sizal  and  rubber. 

The  coast  of  Angola  was  traced  by  Portuguese  navigators  in  the  fifteenth  century 
and  Portugal  has  had  some  effective  population  for  three  and  a  half  centuries.  During 
the  days  of  the  slave  export  to  the  Americas  great  numbers  of  slaves  were  brought  out 
from  Central  Africa  by  trails  which  led  down  to  the  slave  markets  of  Loanda  and 
Benguela,  where  slave  ships  awaited  their  cargoes  for  the  West  Indies  and  Brazil.  All 
such  trade  was  cut  off  in  the  nineteenth  century  and  in  1876  the  King  of  Portugal  pro¬ 
claimed  the  abolition  of  slavery.  Portugal  signed  the  Berlin  Act  of  1885  and  the 
Brussels  Act  of  1890  binding  the  signatories  to  employ  every  means  possible  to  put  an  end 
to  the  slave  trade  and  to  punish  those  who  engage  in  it.  But  there  came  a  great  develop¬ 
ment  of  cocoa  growing  on  the  islands  of  San  Thome  and  Principe,  lying  in  the  Gulf  of 
Guinea  and  belonging  to  Portugal,  so  that  great  numbers  of  “contract  laborers”  were 
shipped  from  the  mainland  to  these  islands.  Between  1888  and  1912  there  is  record  of 
67,000  black  laborers  sent  to  the  islands,  but  presently  it  was  noticed  that  none  returned 
and  the  suspicion  grew  up  that  the  contracts  supposed  to  be  entered  into  by  the  laborer 
of  his  own  free  will  were  a  “blind”  and  that  the  laborers  were  really  slaves. 

In  1901-1902  a  British  officer,  Col.  Colin  Harding,  traversed  Angola  and  in  1905  pub¬ 
lished  “In  Remotest  Barotzeland”  in  which  he  records  how  again  and  again  he  came  upon 
gruesome  evidences  of  a  slave  trade.  In  1904-5  the  well  known  English  journalist  Mr.  H. 
W.  Nevinson  penetrated  Angola,  followed  the  routes  (to  be  traced  by  skeletons  and 
shackles)  by  which  slaves  are  brought  down  from  the  interior,  took  passage  on  the  ships 
carrying  these  slaves  to  the  Cocoa  Islands,  where  they  were  transmuted  into  “contract 
laborers,”  and  investigated  the  details  of  their  life  on  the  plantations.  His  findings,  pub¬ 
lished  in  part  in  Harper’s  Magazine  and  afterwards  in  his  book  “A  Modern  Slavery” 
reached  a  large  public.  In  1908-1909  Rev.  Charles  Swan,  a  British  missionary  of  long 
residence  in  Angola  gathered  impressive  evidence  of  the  existence  of  an  organized  slave 
trade  in  the  Colony,  which  he  published  in  a  little  book  called  “The  Slavery  of  Today.” 
Shortly  after  the  veteran  English  missionary  Dan  Crawford,  to  whom  Angola  has  been 
known  since  1888,  in  his  brilliant  and  widely  read  book  “Thinking  Black,”  set  forth  his 
observations  on  the  slave  trade  at  its  sources  in  the  distant  interior. 

Another  ray  of  light  was  shot  into  this  dark  business  by  certain  cocoa  firms — Messrs. 
Cadbury,  Fry,  Rountree  and  Stellwerck — which  came  to  have  misgivings  as  to  the  methods 
by  which  much  of  their  raw  cocoa  was  produced.  In  1905  they  sent  out  a  representative, 
Mr.  Joseph  Burt,  who  spent  nearly  two  years  in  studying  conditions  on  the  Islands  and  on 
the  mainland.  The  facts  he  assembled  became  the  principal  basis  for  Mr.  W.  A.  Cadbury’s 
book,  “Labour  in  Portuguese  West  Africa.” 

Impelled  by  public  opinion  and  the  Anti-Slavery  Society  the  British  Government, 
which  for  centuries  has  been  bound  by  treaty  to  guarantee  Portugal’s  African  possessions, 
began  to  use  its  influence  with  the  Portuguese  Government  against  the  further  recruitment 
of  natives  of  Angola  for  the  cocoa  plantations  and  for  the  repatriation  of  the  tens  of 
thousands  of  laborers  who  had  been  brought  to  the  Islands  and  kept  there  against  their 
will.  The  whole  story  of  these  efforts  is  found  in  the  series  of  White  Books  (Africa  No. 
2,  1912;  Africa  No.  2,  1913;  Africa  No.  1,  1914;  Africa  No.  1,  1915,  and  Africa  No.  1, 
1917)  entitled  “Correspondence  Respecting  Contract  Labour  in  Portuguese  West  Africa.” 
It  comprises  355  official  communications  and  dispatches  between  July  15,  1909  and  February 
27,  1917. 

It  should  be  said  that  the  state  of  slavery  brought  out  in  the  voluminous  literature 
just  described  appears  to  have  passed  away.  Not  one  of  our  informants  so  much  as 
breathed  the  word  “slavery”  or  “slave  trade.”  We  never  heard  the  slightest  suggestion 
that  in  Portuguese  Africa  now  there  is  any  ownership  of  a  black  by  white.  The  rise  of 
the  system  of  state  requisitioning  of  native  labor  and  state  leasing  of  this  labor  to  private 
parties  frees  the  white  man  of  all  temptation  to  acquire  ownership  of  the  labor  he  needs. 


Area. 

Population. 

Climate. 

Crops. 


Slavery  abolished. 


Contract  labor. 


Abuses  exposed. 


Cocoa  traders. 


British  government 
reports. 


No  slavery. 


Page  6 


DATE  DUE 

fTB  1  0'<$ 

GAYLORD 

PRINTED  IN  U.S.  A. 

